The Great Portuguese Sausage Shootout

Being half Portuguese, it’s fitting that I do a thorough job of covering one of Hawaii’s favorite ethnic foods, the Portuguese Sausage. Hawaii’s manufacturers mostly stick by a similar recipe that is unique to the islands, setting ours apart from those found on the mainland… or possibly even in Portugal.

The most popular way to eat it is for breakfast as simply Portuguese Sausage, Eggs and Rice. Comfort food at its best. Most Hawaii restaurants that serve breakfast have Portuguese sausage as an option to bacon, breakfast links or ham, including national chains such as McDonald’s and iHop.

What inspired me to have a Portuguese Sausage shootout is the wide selection of locally-made brands and varieties that fill our supermarket shelves today, commonly taking up to 4 feet of meat department refrigerator shelf space.

So let the battle begin!…

The players (top to bottom):

• Redondo’s Lisboa Portuguese Brand Sausage, 10 oz., $1.99 (sale price) from Don Quijote.
  Ingredients: Pork, water, salt, flavorings, sugar, sodium phosphate, monosodium glutamate, oleo-resin of parika, sodiumerythorbate, sodium nitrite, packed in collagen casing.
• Uncle Louie’s Fully Cooked Mild Portuguese Brand Sausage Stick, package of 3 at 48 oz. (3 lbs.) total, $10 from Costco.
  Ingredients: Pork, water, salt, non-fat dry milk, paprika, vinegar, garlic, chili pepper, spice, sweetener (sucralose), sodium nitrite.
• Gouvea’s Portuguese Brand Sausage (Linguica). 10 oz., $1.99 from Don Quijote.
  Ingredients: Pork, water, salt, spices, garlic, paprika, sodium erythorbate, sodium nitrite.
• Rego’s Purity of Hawaii Mild Portuguese Brand Sausage. 10 oz., $1.99 from Marukai Market Place.
  Ingredients: Pork, water, nonfat dry milk, salt, vinegar, sugar, flavorings, paprika, sodium phosphate, sodium erythorbate, sodium nitrite, oleoresin of paprika, packed in collagen casing.
• Aloha Brand Portuguese Brand Sausage Hawaiian Style (distributed by Gouvea’s Inc.). 5 oz., $1.29 from Don Quijote.
  Ingredients: Pork, water, salt, dextrose, spices, hydrolyzed wheat protien, paprika, sodium phosphate, garlic, spice extractives, natural flavorings, sodium erythorbate, sodium nitrite and collagen casing.
• Pacific Sausage Mild Portuguese Brand Sausage (Linguica), 5 oz., 99 cents from Don Quijote.
  Ingredients: Pork, water, salt, vinegar, sugar, flavoring, spices, garlic, paprika, sodium phosphate, sodium erythorbate, dextrose, sodium nitrite, sodium citrate.
• Hawaiian Sausage Company Mild Portuguese Brand Sausage (distributed by Rego’s Purity Food Co., Inc.), 5 oz., 99 cents from Marukai Market Place.
  Ingredients: Pork, water, nonfat dry milk, salt, vinegar, flavorings, paprika, sodium phosphate, smoke flavoring, sodium erythorbate, sodium nitrite, oleoresin of paprika, packed in collagen casing.
• Gouvea’s Portuguese Brand Sausage Made with Pork and Chicken, 5 oz., $1.29 from Don Quijote.
  Ingredients: Pork, mechanically separated chicken, water, salt, spices, garlic, paprika, sodium erythorbate, sodium nitrite and collagen casing.
• Redondo’s Mo’ono Sweet Hot Portuguese Brand Sausage, 5 oz., 99 cents from Marukai Market Place.
  Ingredients: Pork, water, soy sauce, sugar, salt, flavorings, sodium phosphate, monosodium glutamate, oleoresin of paprika, sodium erythorbate, sodium nitrite, packed in collagen casing.
• Frank’s Foods Portuguese Brand Sausage (from Hilo), 12 oz., $2.49 (on sale) from Ward Marukai.
  Ingredients: Pork, beef, dextrose, salt, soy protein concentrate, paprika, sodium phosphate, flavorings, hydrolyzed soy protein, garlic powder, msg, smoke flavoring, sodium erythorbate, sodium nitrite.
• Kukui Sausage Co, Inc. Portuguese Brand Sausage, 8 oz., $1.99 (on sale) from Ward Marukai..
  Ingredients: Pork, water, salt, sugar, flavorings, paprika, sodium phosphate, sodium nitrite, chili powder, sodium erythorbate.

With (now) 11 players on the “field”, I had to be careful in properly identifying each one for an accurate comparison. While they’re each slightly varied in color and size, for the most part, they all share the same DNA, so labeling was the only way to do it…

As you can see, they all have distinguishable marbeling; some more pronounced than others…

The newest player on the field is Uncle Louie’s, made in Kahului, Maui and available in a bulk pack of 3 HUGE (I mean HUGE) 1 pound sausages at Costco. On a side note to Costco, they also sell Redondo’s Portuguese Sausage in preformed “Spam Musubi” rectangular shapes. How cool is that!

Portuguese Sausage tastes best pan-fried for serving…

I cut 4 slices from each brand, about 3/8″ thick at a bias (diagonally) to provide more surface area.

The only way to give this shootout a fare shake was to accompany the taste test with its true companion, eggs and rice!…

Post edit additions, top to bottom (back to front): Ume Musubi, pickled cucumber, takuan (palate buffers), Frank’s Foods (Hilo), Redondo’s and Kukui brand Portuguese Sausage (uncooked left and cooked right)

Yes, call me crazy. I felt that way attempting to properly plate, sort and label this spread. But tell me that doesn’t look good! Notice I added a couple slices of Takuan, a Japanese picked turnip. I learned this from the mama sans at Tropic Fish and Vegetable market, who makes their Portuguese Sausage, eggs and rice breakfast bento with this. It adds balance, harmony and helps buffer the palate. Try it with Takuan. The best!

The results!..

1. Frank’s Foods Portuguese Brand Sausage:
   Pork, beefy, smoky and tight; not too fatty or greasy. You haven’t had local style Portuguese Sausage until you’ve had Franks!
   
2. Rego’s Purity of Hawaii Mild Portuguese Brand Sausage:
   Slightly sweet twang; mild spices; porky; soft casing; well-balanced overall.
   
3. Hawaiian Sausage Company Mild Portuguese Brand Sausage (distributed by Rego’s Purity Food Co., Inc.):
   Smokey!, mildly spicy, porky & moist. Even with the added smoke component, this one was also very well balanced and packed with flavor.
   
4. Redondo’s Mo’ono Sweet Hot Portuguese Brand Sausage:
   Tender; porky; moist; hot but spice influence is mild.
   
5. Gouvea’s Portuguese Brand Sausage (Linguica):
   Spicy, somewhat salty, semi-beefy, semi-porky (are those real terms?), pronounced marbeling, overall great flavor.
   
6. Redondo’s Lisboa Portuguese Brand Sausage:
   Redondo’s is great, but Gouvea’s slightly beefy profile gives it just a little more character than Redondo’s. Still, this is good, and even in 6th place, it’s something I’ll put in the shopping cart on an impulse buy.
   
7. Pacific Sausage Mild Portuguese Brand Sausage (Linguica)
   This reminds me of a stepped-down Purity in flavor profile. Stepped down enough to rank about here.
   
8. Uncle Louie’s Fully Cooked Mild Portuguese Brand Sausage Stick:
   Significant Paprika flavor; pronounced marbeling gave it a really “fatty” character, for better or worse; somewhat salty; doesn’t taste porky, more beefy.
   
9. Aloha Brand Portuguese Brand Sausage Hawaiian Style (distributed by Gouvea’s Inc.):
   More zesty; paprika too noticeable, yet still good; doesn’t taste like “traditional” Portuguease sausage.
   
10. Kukui Sausage Co, Inc. Portuguese Brand Sausage:
    Decent, but lacks character. It’ s just OK, still slightly better than the last place contender as follows.
    
11. Gouvea’s Portuguese Brand Sausage Made with Pork and Chicken:
    Subtle flavor, not much marbleization.
    

Post edit: Frank’s Foods from Hilo is my favorite! The beef and the smoke flavoring, combined with the texture, which is tight and not to fatty make this one stand out. And allthough there’s beef in it, which is out of the norm from the rest of the pack, it still screams loud and proud, “I’m the best Portuguese Sausage!”

Rego’s Purity of Hawaii Mild Portuguese Brand Sausage was my overall favorite. With that, it’s still a close contender for first place, but I’ll hand that to Franks. The Purity won a blind taste test by four members in our household. I wouldn’t kick any one of these brands off the table, but if I could only choose one, Franks would be first, then Rego’s Purity. As for Purity, flavorful balance is the best way to describe it. It also caramelized nicely due its sugar component. My next choice also comes from Rego’s with their Hawaiian Sausage Company variety. The added smokiness really serves it well, and goes GREAT with those sunny-side up eggs. Excellent.

Whew. Let me tell you, that was alot of work. It wasn’t easy to try that much Portuguese Sausage in one sitting. After that, I didn’t eat for the rest of the day. That’s how full I was! The spices really give an aftertaste doesn’t go away for a long time. lol But it’s all good.

Next time you go grocery shopping, pick up a few brands of Portuguese Sausage and compare them yourself. You might find nuances in each that I couldn’t find, or a flavor preference that best suits you. Then after that, go on a diet for the rest of the week. I’m going vegetarian for the next 5 days after this. My blood is still boiling. lol

P.S.

Gouvea also makes this “Hot Dog”…

Gouvea’s Portuguese Brand Hot Dogs

It may look like a hot dog on the outside, but bite into it and you know what? It’s pretty much a miniature Portuguese Sausage! Same paprika, vinegar, and garlic flavor, sans the chili pepper. Very porky, including the marbelized fat in it. It’s really ono!

Gouvea’s Portuguese Brand Hot Dog, boiled and sliced in half

Next time I gotta’ try it in a hot dog bun. Maybe with just ketchup and chopped onions.

I also tried Redondo’s Arabiki Sausage…

Redondo’s ARABIKI course gournd sausage made with pork (Mo’ono selection), $2.99 from Marukai.

Per the instructions on the package, I boiled them for about 3 minutes…

They’re sort small, but they really pack flavor! Smokey, slightly sweet and savory in a shoyu-kind-of way, and moist inside. But the most important feature of these little babies is that SNAPPY CRUNCH of the casing. Nice! I’m not sure how I’d incorporate this in a recipe, but just alone as a pupu works for me. Pick some up and try.. I bet you’ll like it.