What do you do when your month of Wiener Wednesdays collides with Hannibal Week?
You make a sausage-centric dish from Feeding Hannibal, that’s what!
This is Heart With Sausage Stuffing.
I could also just repost that time I made homemade sausages using the recipe from the cards I bought in the Hannibal Prop Store auction, but what fun would that be?
I was undaunted by this recipe because I have prepared heart before–and to surprising success. So I thought this would be easy-breezy. Also, I had a beef heart in my freezer.
Step one was to whittle away all the fat and that shiny skin layer.
Step two was the stuffing.
The recipe calls for the heart to be stuffed with a mix of honey-garlic breakfast sausages and herbed salad croutons.
Here come the substitutes!
Because of course there are substitutes.
My local market didn’t have breakfast sausages at the butcher counter, so the closest thing I could find was Bob Evans breakfast links.
I didn’t have salad croutons. But my thinking was “isn’t Stove Top stuffing basically the same thing?”
I stuffed with the stuffing, wrapped the thing in bacon, and then semi-trussed it.
I looked at youtube videos to learn how to truss, but after three attempts I said “fuck it” and spiraled twine around the heart.
So into the oven it goes–with onion, carrots, and apple cider vinegar.
I was having issues with my oven temp (because of course I’m having issues with the oven temp) so it ended up being in the oven longer than the recommended 45 minutes.
The result:
Tasting notes:
Ew.
The heart was overcooked. The bacon undercooked.
The stuffing was teetering on gross.
Maybe Stove Top stuffing and Bob Evans breakfast links aren’t basically the same thing as herbed salad croutons and honey-garlic breakfast sausages…?
It was a mouthful of sage.
And what the fuck is with all the apple cider vinegar? So. Much. Apple. Cider. Vinegar.
It’s all it smelled like.
I am honestly confused by this recipe.
Verdict:
NO.
Um.
Okay.
Shit.
Well this is interesting…
Would you believe it if I told you that it wasn’t until right now I realized the recipe called for pork hearts? And also that I the recipe called for apple cider and NOT apple cider vinegar?
I wouldn’t believe it, except for the fact that I, myself, did it. I am living it.
I shit you not. This did not register in my brain until I was writing this.
I am suddenly worried about my sanity and my reading comprehension.
No, seriously.
Maybe The ‘Rona has finally gotten to me.
If you’re new and want to see more of my dishes from and inspired by Hannibal (that are 1000x more successful than this one), click HERE.
Don’t feel bad. When I looked at the photo of the recipe, my brain also initially registered it as ACV. I’m blaming it on the fact that ACV has become so trendy and ubiquitous; it’s like the new coconut oil.
If it makes you feel any better, my grandma tried to clean out our sink with apple cider one time when I was a kid. She couldn’t get over how good the “vinegar” smelled and how poorly it cleaned until she realized it was just apple cider– not vinegar.
That actually does make me feel better.
Slashing the heart in order to stuff it makes the dish that much more “Hannibalesque!”
I wonder if sweet Italian sausage might work better than breakfast links — or even just pork mince with some honey and garlic mixed in. I’ve also found that precooking the bacon just a little to render some of the fat (either parboiling or a minute or two in the microwave) helps me get a better outer wrapping without overcooking the meat it’s surrounding. And if I’m braising, just a minute or two in a pan or under the broiler crisps it right up.
I think this recipe should get a Mulligan. ; )
I think trussing is one of those things that looks easy when you’re watching someone else do it but IRL takes weeks of training. And this sounds like how a lot of my recipes go. I read them wrong, forget to put things in. Whoever heard of honey garlic breakfast sausage? Like that’s a thing. And in your defense, using stuffing to stuff certainly seems logical….
Thank you for following my flawed logic. ha!
Ewwww is right!! Now you need to remake it? Pork heart might taste better especially with the cider. I have to say I’ve done the same thing when I’m following a sewing “recipe”. 🤦🏻♀️
If I remember right, as a kid, pork heart and liver does taste better than beef….and well…..apples go with pork very well…..
Pork Chops and Applesauce 😁
Don’t mention pork chops and applesauce to me! You’re gonna give me Chopped flashbacks.
I think I am going to give this one another try and do it right!
I’m sorry. That’s exactly what I was thinking of. I loved seeing you on tv and I thought you did fantastic! My sincere apologies for the flashbacks..
😊🥃