Sausage Party

Our friends invited us out to their camp for a cookout over the weekend and when it came time to offer something for the meal my first choice was naturally sausage (what else would I bring?). Now I love Hofmann hot dogs and coneys (Snappy Grillers), pair them with some salt potatoes and you've got the taste of Central New York in the summertime, but when I want something truly special, a treat that I reserve for every now and then, there is only one place to head -
Liehs & Steigerwald.



Tucked away on the north side of Syracuse in what once was a mostly German neighborhood, Liehs & Steigerwald has withstood the test of time for the last 70 years. Even as many of their customers moved away from the neighborhood, they've managed to keep them coming back by providing them with the finest quality, craft-made specialty meat products. Always a family run operation, they are a full service butcher shop with choice cuts of meat, house cold cuts (including such delights as German-style blood sausage, tongue and head cheese), smoked meats and sausages. You'll find over eighteen different types of bratwurst alone in their repertoire - all based on original family recipes. They don't only limit themselves to bratwurst though, you'll find Italian, Kielbasa, Chorizo, Andouille, the list goes on. . .



Don't let the out of the way location fool you, on a recent Saturday the place was packed and I had to wait in line to get my hands on some dogs and brats. When it was finally my turn, I chose German franks, coneys, Bavarian brats and chicken wing brats. I've sampled several different varieties of their bratwurst over time and I still haven't put a dent in all eighteen. You'll usually find a healthy dozen or so varieties available at any given time and they change based on season.




Liehs & Steigerwald carries their own prepared foods such as sauerbraten, potato salad, pierogies and cabbage rolls and also offers a wide selection of imported grocery items from spaetzle mix to curry ketchup and digestive bitters. Additionally, they have their own private label horseradish and horseradish mustard that is not for the faint of heart, but a real stand-out specialty if that's your thing (I happen to love them). The wide array of items they carry is impressive given the size of their shop.


What can I say about our selections? After firing them on the grill and bringing them in to the table they were as amazing as always. I think I got at least one bite of everything and even a whole chicken wing brat to myself. I'll say this, they were as good as any sausage I've had in Germany, maybe even better.


Liehs & Steigerwald
1857 Grant Blvd.
Syracuse, NY 13208
315-474-2171

The Colonel Can't Lick 'Em

I met my friend John the other day for a beer at Clark's Ale House and he mentioned that his dad had finished construction on a trailer-sized grill and smoker (he showed me a picture of it on his Blackberry and it is impressive). Seems that John's dad had big plans - he had hit a huge sale at the grocery store and was making 40 lbs of Cornell recipe chicken for a Memorial Day cookout. I had never heard of Cornell Chicken but was intrigued, not only by the sheer amount that he could fit on that grill but also what made chicken "Cornell Chicken".

Apparently Cornell Chicken is a Central New York fixture (I guess as a transplant I hadn't come across this one yet) and Cornell tailgate parties and local firehouse barbeques are never complete without chicken prepared with this special barbeque sauce.

Naturally I had to try it. So when I got home I hit Google to figure out what all of the fuss was about. Apparently the late Cornell professor Robert C. Baker was the grand-daddy of American chicken consumption and with benevolent altruism bestowed on the world not only this barbeque sauce recipe but such other poultry-based foods as chicken nuggets and turkey ham to name a few.

After reading up on the recipe and the comments on a few different message boards where transplanted Central New Yorkers and locals alike waxed poetic about virtues of Cornell Chicken I knew I had to have it, so I hit the store and got my hands on a mess of legs and thighs.

The recipe looks like the average vinegar-based barbeque sauce recipe, nothing all that different from spiedies or even North Carolina style barbeque sauce:

Cornell Chicken Barbeque Sauce/Finger Lakes Marinade Recipe

Recipe for Barbeque Sauce (enough for 10 halves):

1 cup cooking oil

1 pint cider vinegar

3 tablespoons salt

1 tablespoon poultry seasoning

1/2 teaspoon pepper

1 egg


Beat the egg, then add the oil and beat again. Add other ingredients and stir. The recipe can be varied to suit individual tastes.


I think the true magic of this sauce is in the egg. Think about what an egg wash does to bread, it browns it and gives it a nice crust. Same thing happens here - the chicken gets brown and crispy. The egg also helps the marinade stick pretty well to the chicken. I opted to skin the chicken first in an attempt to go for the healthy choice and it was still crispy even without the skin.

A long soak in the marinade and generous mopping often during the cooking also helped quite a bit with the flavor. And boy was the flavor awesome - tangy with just the right amount of salty and savory to complement the chicken's juiciness perfectly!

Unfortunately we ate it all before I got any pictures but you get the idea. So here's to you Professor Baker, the colonel ain't got nothing on your chicken!

Food Lust

I love food. I know, everyone loves food and it seems like everyone is blogging about it nowadays. Food blogs have become a dime a dozen lately. I get it, everyone has something to say about their particular food obsession. But I don't really have an angle, no food crusade, no specialized skill or niche. I just love what I love and want to tell everyone about it.

What's not to love about food? Food has so much more to offer than mere sustenance – it's loaded with meaning - emotionally, aesthetically, culturally, pleasurably . . . you don't just eat food, you live it.

I won't lie and say that I'm not a bit of a snob, I don't love everything and I do draw a line in some places, not every restaurant or food gets equal treatment. But the line isn't always where you might expect. I have just as much love for a good diner or hot dog stand as I do for haute cuisine, maybe even more. And I have to say, I've eaten in way more diners than five star restaurants. I also have to admit that while I prefer to steer clear of chain restaurants there are always the guilty pleasures. I know I can't talk smack one day and then sneak off to McDonald's when no one is looking so I won't cast the first stone (chicken nuggets are my kryptonite).

Now I mentioned that I don't have an angle and I don't really, but there are some food topics that interest me more than others like the culture and traditions of food and foodways. I'm fully inspired whenever I listen to Alton Brown or Anthony Bourdain talk about the cultural impact of food or how it carries historical and cultural meaning. I live for figuring out regional specialties and variations and understanding the people behind those foods. I'm somewhat of an introvert especially around new people so I often try to experience new places through food instead of actually talking to anyone. If I'm headed on a trip you can bet I'm reading up on what foods are special where I'm headed - what foods are the ambassadors of those places and where I can find them.

I'm a self-professed food geek. I admit to reading foodtimeline.org during my lunch hour and studying up on the history and variation of a particular recipe before I try to prepare it. Generally when my kids ask me what we're eating for dinner they get a dissertation on the historical and cultural implications of that food along with the etymology thrown in for good measure.

Finally a few notes on what I love. As I already mentioned, I love regional food, I love to find the local hole-in-the-wall that does it the best (whatever "it" happens to be). I also love to seek out and try every different kind of ethnic food I can locate. I have a particular weakness for every type of eastern cuisine I can get my hands on: Vietnamese, Thai, Lao, Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Malaysian, Indian, you name it. As you can see from the name of this blog, I really love pork. I once watched an episode of a Mario Batali special called Mario Eats Italy that was devoted to sausage and I experienced uncontrollable cravings for sausage for a whole month afterward. I would be lying if I said that I didn't eats ribs from the Dinosaur BBQ at least three times a month and for the last six months or so I've been trying to perfect my recipe for pork carnitas.

So what can you expect to read here? Probably a smattering of things from the story of a restaurant I love or a new one I've tried to a really great recipe or how I finally got my ribs smoked just right. I just hope you come away hungry, I expect if you're anything like me you'll read about something here and just maybe you won't be satified until you've tried it too.