Morcilla Parrillera (Argentine Grilling Blood Sausage)

Morcilla parrillera is the blood sausage of the Argentine and Uruguayan grill: a soft, dark, onion-sweet link that goes on the parrilla next to the chorizos at the start of an asado, comes off with a crackling casing, and is eaten spread on bread or by the spoonful. It is a cooked sausage — the law in Argentina defines morcilla as one — so the grill only heats and crisps it. What separates it from its Spanish ancestor is the filler. A morcilla de Burgos is mostly onion and rice; the Argentine one is built on blood, cooked and minced pork skin, diced fat and a lot of onion and scallion, with no rice, which gives a softer, richer, almost spreadable inside that holds together on the coals because of the gelatin in the skin. It is the oldest sausage on the asado, given the newest cooking method. Blood must come from a licensed, inspected source; it is the most perishable thing in the kitchen. I have not made this one yet; the formula is built from an Argentine trade formula and the Argentine food code, and it is untested.

Ingredients

FILLING (about 2.7 kg / 6 lb)

• 1,000 ml / 34 fl oz fresh pork blood, with anticoagulant, from a licensed processor (about 37%)
• 450 g / 1 lb pork skin (rind), scraped clean (about 17% cooked weight)
• 300 g / 10.5 oz pork shoulder or jowl (about 11%)
• 350 g / 12.3 oz pork back fat, diced 5 mm (about 13%)
• 400 g / 14 oz white onion, finely chopped (about 15%)
• 200 g / 7 oz scallions (cebolla de verdeo), white and green, chopped (about 7%)
• 30 g / 1 oz lard, to sweat the onions

SEASONING (for the whole batch, about 2.7 kg)

• 46 g fine salt (1.7% of filling)
• 5 g black pepper, fine
• 3 g nutmeg, fresh grated
• 1.5 g ground clove
• 3 g dried oregano, rubbed
• 1 g ground cumin
• 8 g sweet paprika
• 60 ml / 2 fl oz dry red wine (optional)
• 38–45 mm beef middles or 36–40 mm hog casings, about 10 ft / 3 m, tied in 8–10 in / 20–25 cm links
• 1 roll butcher’s twine

Directions

Key ingredients

Black Pepper

1. In the collection: Black Pepper and Allspice are the usual blood-sausage spice family; this one leans on nutmeg and clove. The Spanish ancestor is Morcilla de Burgos, which shows exactly what the Argentine version left out (the rice).
2. Blood first — the safety step: buy blood from a licensed, inspected source, already treated with anticoagulant (US law permits edible blood only from inspected-and-passed animals at an official establishment). Keep it at or below 38 °F / 3 °C, strain it through a fine sieve before use, and use it within 48 hours of collection. If it smells sour or has clotted solid, throw it out. Frozen blood is fine thawed once in the fridge; never refreeze it.
3. Cook the skin and meat: simmer the pork skin and shoulder in lightly salted water until the skin is completely tender, 1½–2 hours. The skin is the binder here: its gelatin is what lets a rice-free morcilla hold its shape over a fire. Under-cooked skin stays as rubbery bits — it should dent easily under a fingernail. Cool, then grind skin and meat through a 6–8 mm plate.
4. Sweat the alliums: cook the onion and scallion slowly in the lard until soft and sweet but not brown, 15–20 minutes. Raw onion would stay crunchy and weep water into the casing. Cool to room temperature.
5. Mix — cool, not hot: combine the ground skin and meat, diced fat, onions, salt and spices, then stir in the cold blood and wine. The mix must be cool (below 90 °F / 32 °C) when the blood goes in, or the blood starts to set in the bowl. Expect a loose, pourable batter.
6. Stuff loosely: tie off one end, fill through a wide funnel or a stuffer with the piston at low speed, and leave room — blood sausage expands as it cooks and an over-filled casing bursts. Tie into links. Rinse the outside.
7. Poach, never boil: lower the links into water at 175–185 °F / 80–85 °C and hold it there, turning them, 35–45 minutes, until the centre reaches 160 °F / 71 °C and a needle pushed in brings up no red liquid. The Argentine trade method cooks at 88 °C to 72 °C inside. Boiling curdles the blood into grains and splits the casings. Prick any link that floats with air to release it.
8. Chill: lift them into iced water, then dry and refrigerate. They keep 4–5 days chilled, or freeze.
9. Grill: over medium coals, 10–15 minutes, turning gently with tongs — never a fork — until the casing blisters and crackles and the inside is hot through. It softens as it heats, so handle it as little as possible. Serve with bread, or in a roll as morcipán.
10. Sibling recipe: the other half of the asado’s opening round is Chorizo Criollo (Argentine Grilling Chorizo).

Notes

Where this recipe came from — and what it isn’t. The backbone is the “Receta de Morcilla Tradicional” published by El Portal del Chacinado, an Argentine trade site (cooked pork skin, pork, cebolla de verdeo, tocino, blood, salt, oregano, cumin, nutmeg, black pepper; cooked at 88 °C to 72 °C inside), checked against the general Argentine chacinado proportion of roughly 20–30% blood and a quarter cooked rind. Deviations: (1) the trade formula’s 125 g wheat gluten and 150 g flour per batch are left out — they are a commercial yield aid, not part of the home tradition; (2) the onion is increased and partly swapped for scallion, which Argentine butchers’ morcillas show; (3) clove and sweet paprika are added from common practice; (4) the final temperature is 160 °F / 71 °C, one degree under the trade figure, as a round household target. Untested.

The correction: no rice. The dive’s South America page describes the parrilla morcilla as “often bound with rice … often the same rice” as Spain. The Argentine sources describe a morcilla built on blood, cooked pork rind, fat and onion, and Argentine writers contrast theirs with the Spanish by saying it does not use rice. Rice is the Burgos model, and some Argentine butchers make a rice morcilla too, but it is not the default on the grill. What holds the rice-free version together is the gelatin from the skin.

What the law says. Argentina’s Código Alimentario defines morcilla as a cooked sausage made on the basis of the blood of permitted animals, “desfibrinada y filtrada” — defibrinated and filtered. It lists liver morcilla and a tongue morcillón as named variants.

Where morcilla came from. Spain’s morcilla and Portugal’s morcela crossed with the settlers, and there was no pig in the Americas to make one from before they did. The blood sausage is among the oldest and most conservative foods there is; the asado’s contribution was to put it on the coals. No date is documented for that change.

Variations. Uruguay makes a morcilla dulce — sweet, with sugar, orange peel, raisins and walnuts — beside the savoury salada; the two are often grilled together. Morcilla vasca in Argentina is a Basque-style version with more spice and sometimes leeks. Some butchers add a little cooked rice or bread to stretch it. A morcilla taken out of its casing and spread on bread is a normal way to eat it, not a failure.

Sourcing and gear. Blood: an Asian, Latin or Polish butcher who carries frozen pork blood from an inspected plant, or a meat processor. Rind: ask the butcher for fresh pork skin, or use skin trimmed from a belly. A thermometer in the poaching water matters more than anything else here. Beef middles give the traditional wide, curved link.

Still open. No Argentine primary source with weights for a home morcilla parrillera specifically has been read; the trade formula is the closest. The Uruguayan morcilla dulce proportions are not documented here.

The photo. The photograph is an Argentine parrilla loaded with chorizos and morcillas together, as they are cooked at an asado.

Read more on the site. South America