Sausage is a common food all over the world, eaten at breakfast, lunch, and dinner depending on locale. Sausage has been made for centuries among many cultures, with long culinary traditions surrounding the craft. Traditionally, sausage was an efficient use of all parts of a slaughtered animal, and was easy to preserve via drying or smoking. As meat became easier to keep fresh, sausage remained popular because of the wide variety of delicious types and flavors.

Sausage consists of meat stuffed into the scraped intestines of an animal, frequently the animal it originated from. The intestines are scraped to ensure cleanliness and also to form a thin outer membrane for the sausage which will keep the meat encased. The meat is ground and then forced into the long membrane, which is twisted periodically to form elongated tubes of meat, known as sausages. Modern sausage is sometimes made with artificial casings, but most butchers are able to provide traditional sausage.

The magic of sausage is in the type of meat, the seasoning used, and the preparations made before the meat is turned into sausages. Sausage is made from all sorts of meat, including pork, beef, chicken, turkey, and venison. Sometimes sausages will mix these meats to create a balanced flavor, with poultry sausage becoming more common in the twentieth century due to the lower fat content and preferred flavor. Sausage is also made from a variety of cuts of meat, although traditionally it is made with liver and offcuts, so that the slaughtered animal could be utilized efficiently. Many cultures also have a tradition of blood sausage, which mixes blood from the slaughtered animal with the meat, resulting in a dense, black sausage which is highly prized.

Sausage is seasoned with a wide variety of things, ranging from fruits and vegetables to herbs. Many fruits such as apples are popular, lending a sweet, summery flavor to the meat. In addition, most sausage is salted and peppered, with some sausage being extensively salted to assist with the preservation process. The spicing determines the ultimate flavor of the sausage, and is infinitely variable.

When making sausage, the cook usually starts with a freshly slaughtered animal. The intestines are cleaned and set aside while the meat selected for the sausages is chopped and loosely cooked with any seasonings. A common recipe begins with caramelized onions mixed with apples and fresh herbs. The meat is added and the mixture is stirred carefully to ensure even distribution of all the ingredients. Then, the sausage meat is forced into the casing, which is usually held in a device called a stuffer while the cook works.

After the sausage has been stuffed and twisted, it can be kept as fresh sausage and eaten in a few days, or it can be cured. Sausage is often cured by smoking or wind drying, although it can also be cooked and canned. The choice to leave the sausage fresh or cured depends on the desired flavor. Cured sausage tends to be more mellow in flavor, while fresh sausage is more meaty. Fresh sausage is often used in sauces and soups where fresh meat would normally be used, and can be frozen for future use.