"Sausages, which were once staple fare in the UK, fell out of fashion as palates were refined through exposure to a wider variety of foreign foods.However, people are now rediscovering sausages and it is estimated 189,000 tonnes will be consumed this year."Although not an obvious food to have benefited from an increasingly prosperous population, sausages have seen a notable shift towards more premium positioning," said David Bird, a consumer analyst at Mintel, whose survey uncovered the trend... Sausages are also creeping on to menus in some of the smartest restaurants, including the Ivy in London. Edinburgh and Glasgow now both have restaurants specialising in bangers and mash.Jonathan Crombie, of Crombie's, one of Edinburgh's most famous butcher shops, said: "Premium sausages have definitely become very chic. You just have to look at the number of high-class restaurants and top hotels who are now offering all sorts of varieties."One of the problems with people's perceptions of sausages is that, after the Second World War, there was a marked decrease in quality as meat just wasn't available, and so people's memories of sausages in childhood are tainted by that."The sausage has become a high-quality product again and, as people's palettes [sic] have developed, they are willing to be more adventurous with flavours."We do 45 types of sausages, including varieties such as whisky, hog and wild thyme. I did a champagne and truffle sausage for a wedding, which came in at £35 per pound."
Champagne and truffle sausages indeed! Some of us mourn the days when sausages consisted of little more than sawdust with a hint of mechanically recovered meat.
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