The flavor of Chinese sausage varies depending on the ingredients used, but it generally has a sweet and savory taste. When you bite into a good lap cheong, you'll get a burst of oil. The texture of lap cheong is harder than that of regular sausages, and it has a bit of a pork jerky-like taste. There is also a slight sweetness that comes with the salty flavor, and some more fatty sausages will have small cubes of fat inside.
If cooked with rice, the rice will absorb its flavor. When looking for a Chinese sausage substitute, Italian sausage is a good option. This type of sausage tastes very different and can be found in most grocery stores. It's also relatively easy to cook, making it a good substitute for those who are not familiar with cooking meat.
Chorizo is another option; this Spanish or Mexican pork is precooked and cured and comes in a variety of options. It is spicy and is often served for breakfast or as part of a larger meal. Sausage is raw meat seasoned with fennel or anise, resulting in a less spicy flavor. Some say it tastes similar to Italian salami or Italian-style sausage, while others compare its texture and flavor to a dry roasted pork or even to minced meat covered with hot paprika. Different provinces in China produce different flavors of Chinese sausages.
For example, Cantonese sausage (lap cheong), which is the most common, tastes sweeter than Sichuan sausages, which use local Sichuan pepper and chili peppers, resulting in a very strong spicy flavor. Although you can see different levels of dryness and different types of meat combinations, most Chinese sausages are made with very fatty pork and taste sweet and addictive. The easiest way to cook Chinese sausages is to cut them into slices and drop the slices with raw rice into a rice cooker. You can also put the links in the same pot (or rice cooker) in which you are cooking rice. If you decide to cook the sausage with a microwave, make sure to make a few small holes in the surface so that the sausage does not come off during the process. Chinese sausage is tasty in and of itself, although it is also a tasty addition to stir fries and other Chinese dishes.
Macau sausage, sometimes called Chinese sausage or Macau sausage, is a Philippine dried pork sausage. It's not as sweet as lap Cheong, but Sichuan sausages have a very strong spicy flavor that uses local Sichuan pepper and chili peppers. Undercooked or contaminated sausages put your dog at risk of becoming seriously ill due to a parasitic infection called trichinosis. Therefore, it's best to use them if you have an idea of what you want to use them for. Quality sausages should look light and lively with a natural reddish brown color and have a dense, dry gut. This sweet sausage is so popular that it has spread to several regions in Asia, such as Vietnam and the Philippines.
Because they are vacuumed and sealed, sausages are also sold worldwide through most online platforms. I never knew the name of this delicious Chinese sausage until many years later when I found out it's called lap cheong bun. But now that I know I'm going to stock up on some ????.