10种拥有美妙历史的现代食物(3):香肠

Top 10 Modern Foods With (Mostly) Delicious Histories

3. Sausages

3.香肠

The exact origin of the sausage is unclear, with reports ranging around 50,000BC. There is an agreement, however, that the sausages, frankfurters, and hot dogs that people eat on a daily basis originated from a desire to preserve meat.

香肠的准确起源并不清楚，大约在公元前50000年就已经有了相关记载。不过存在着一个共识，那就是人们每天吃的香肠、法兰克福香肠和热狗都是源于人们保存肉类的愿望。

Ever wonder why sausages are wrapped in some form of casing? The reason is that, before refrigeration, butchers would want to preserve meat during transit. They took the meat, organs, and blood of a slaughtered animal, sprinkled it with salt to preserve it, then wrapped the gristly results in the animal's intestine or stomach to stop it going off before it could be eaten.

想知道香肠为什么要用各种肠衣包裹？原因就是在冷藏之前，屠夫想要在运输途中保存肉类。他们将动物屠杀，在所得的肉、五脏和血上撒盐以便保存，然后将这些柔软的东西包进动物的肠或胃里，防止吃之前腐坏。

This is why some sausages contain a large amount of blood in their recipes; the origin of this practice was to help use up any blood that was left over after slaughtering an animal.

这就是为什么有些香肠的制作食谱中包含有大量的血，这种做法是为了用尽屠杀动物后所留下的所有血。

We have no real use for salting today, given how good fridges can be with preserving meat. The tradition of meat in casing, however, still goes strong to this day.

在今天，我们已经无需再盐腌肉类，因为有冰箱可以保存肉类。但是，将肉灌进肠衣的传统至今仍然盛行。