Want to know what makes a great sausage? You won't find out at the Associated Craft Butchers of Ireland's national sausage competition which has become an annual event in Dublin.
Yesterday nearly 200 butchers from across the State took part in the various competitions to find the Supreme Irish Sausage. Suffice to say, the security surrounding the ingredients was as tight as a drum. Indeed when compared to controls over Olympic blood and urine samples, the sausage men were real gold medal winners.
At the end of the competition in CityWest Hotel yesterday evening, the Supreme Sausage title went to Donegal brothers, Ernan and Diarmuid McGettigan who run their shop on the Diamond, Donegal town.
The winning banger was a delicate offering made up of a mixture of lamb, rosemary and plum - Irish grown plum, mark you, and a secret ingredient known only to the Donegal brothers. "Yes, we have secret spices which we use in our sausages and that gives us an edge. Everyone tries something different and new, and we are delighted with this winning sausage because we know it's good," said Ernan.
The McGettigans made their award-winning sausages on Friday night in the privacy of their own shop, brought them to Dublin on Saturday and cooked them for the competition on Saturday night.
As we talked, a rival butcher came and asked for a sample of the supreme winner and was given a tiny piece. "There is no sense in trying to analyse that because you will never find out our secret," he told the rival. "We won the main competition in 2000, the first year it was held, and our sausage demand went up from 150 lbs a week to 1,000 lbs that summer," said Ernan.
There were other major winners at the food event yesterday too with the traditional national sausage title going west to Roger Finnerty of Galway. Peter Callaghan of Ardee was awarded the Black Pudding national title and Robert Savage, Swords, Co Dublin won the National White Pudding Competition. The Drisheen champions were Maurice and Michael Whelan, Carrick-on-Suir and the National Spiced Beef title went to Listowel, Co Kerry butcher, John Griffin.
Mr Pat Brady of the Associated Craft Butchers of Ireland said the decline in the number of butchers' shops during the 1990s had been reversed, with 12 new shops opening in the past 15 months.