Alheira Portuguesa

How to make Portuguese alheira? Portuguese Alheira Recipe. A alheira is a typical, lightly smoked Portuguese sausage originally made only with poultry meat, bread and plenty of garlic. In this recipe I used chicken and pork, but if you want the most original recipe, use only chicken meat. You can replace the chicken/chicken with turkey, duck or any other bird you prefer. It's a simple and very tasty recipe. Smoking is optional but recommended as smoking helps with flavor, color, aroma and protection.

A alheira sausage It has a soft, unctuous dough and goes well with vegetables as alheira is already a good source of proteins, carbohydrates and fat.

Alheira ingredients

• 500g stale/hard bread;
• 500g chicken, with skin and bone;
• 500g pork shank with skin and bone;
• 2 liters of water;
• 10 cloves of garlic;
• 1 medium onion chopped;
• 5g of paprika;
• 3g black pepper;
• parsley and chives to taste;
• 30g salt;
• 2g chilli pepper;
• 2 meters of pork tripe or crooked beef tripe;
• culinary twine to tie;
• charcoal to light the barbecue;
• fruit tree sawdust or eucalyptus for smoking.

Preparation of Portuguese alheira

1. In a large pan, sauté the chopped onion with olive oil. Add the chicken and ham, fry until golden;
2. Add water until it covers the meat. The quantity may vary depending on the dimensions of the pan;
3. Add the paprika, pepper and salt and cook until the meat is falling apart, falling off the bones;
4. While cooking, cut the bread into very thin slices and place them on a large platter;
5. Remove the meat from the pan, shred it and set aside;
6. Add the still hot broth to the bread and stir until it forms a wet dough, but not too soft;
7. Chop the garlic, sausage and chives and brown them in a frying pan with a little olive oil;
8. Add the shredded meat and golden garlic with the sausage and chives over the bread dough and mix well;
9. Prepare the tripe. I used 38/40 caliber natural bovine intestine. Rinse well to hydrate and/or remove salt. You can use pork or collagen casing.
10. Cut the tripe into 15 cm segments and tie one end. Leave an excess on the string to tie the other end after embedding;
11. Insert the segments and close the other end with the piece of string forming a horseshoe (U shape);
12. Smoke with low smoke intensity and little heat (up to 40ºC if possible). Leave it overnight to lightly smoke;
13. After smoking, the sausages are ready for consumption. For a tastier preparation, brown the alheiras in a frying pan with olive oil. They may burst during the process, but that's okay. Other ways of preparation are frying by immersion in oil or in the oven.