I've never been much for sweets. Sure, around the holidays, I'll have a few more sugar cookies than I need, and I've been known to grab a few Russian tea cakes and bourbon balls, but what I really look forward to is the opening of the meat and cheese gift boxes.

My parents would get a half-dozen Hickory Farms boxes every year that would sit under the tree until getting cracked open on New Year's Eve. We'd make a feast of crackers and several 2-ounce blocks of cheddar and smoked gouda, little jellies, and of course, that sublime, slightly smoky, peppery, and so, so very greasy summer sausage.

Supposedly, summer sausage is so named because it was supposed to last the summer without refrigeration. Which I'm almost interested in testing, if I could wait that long. But I can't.

There are a few options for this recipe. First of all, it's sausage, don't worry too much about exact measurements. Second, you can use ground beef straight from the package, or you can run it through a food processor to make a paste. The paste is closer to what's in the gift boxes. It's also a little easier to incorporate the other ingredients (other than the mustard seeds) if you process everything together. I usually don't bother, and tell myself it's more rustic, when the real reason is that I don't want to bother with the food processor.

Third, this is wonderful smoked, and smoking is a preservative, but you can also use a few dashes of liquid smoke (about a quarter tsp per pound of meat, or 6ml/kg). Lastly, if you're into lacto-fermentation and have some brine sitting around, you can add some of that with some sugar and let it sit for a few days before cooking if you really want to go old school.

One thing you don't want to skip is the cure. Prague Powder #1, Insta Cure #1, or Pink curing salt #1 are all the same thing. Without that, the sausage won't taste the same, it won't have that familiar pink tint, and it will won't last nearly as long.

This recipe scales up and down well, but keep the amount of cure to 1 tsp/5 pounds meat  (or about 2.5g per kg). This recipe is a little aggressive; you could easily go lighter on the mustard seeds, garlic, and pepper to get something milder.

Mix everything well, refrigerate at least overnight, 2-3 days would be fine. Pack into sausage casings (I use 2.5-inch casings) and smoke at 250°F until the internal temperature hits 160°F. If you don't have a smoker, try adding 1.5 t liquid smoke. Also, if you don't have sausage casings roll the sausage mix into rolls and wrap in parchment paper.