German Roots
Starting in waves that date back to immigrants fleeing political turmoil in 1848, Germans settled in large numbers in Wisconsin and naturally brought their culture, food, and beer with them. More than a century later, we stand around in parking lots before football games, grilling up batches of bratwursts.Frederick Usinger left Germany in the 1870s, as the family tells it, with $400 in his pocket and a bunch of recipes. He found work in a butcher shop in Milwaukee, and by 1880, he married the niece of the owner, bought the shop, and moved into an upstairs apartment. The building still stands, and Usinger’s still occupies it, above what is now a bustling take-a-number deli counter on the ground floor.
Long ago, the sausage company started shipping its high-quality products around the country, and today, that tradition continues, along with a robust production of mostly German-style meat products available in the region or nationwide in very select retail shops.
Fourth-generation Fritz Usinger runs the show now; his daughter Emily has a master’s in meat science and is also working there. As Usinger puts it, “We view ourselves as caretakers of our great grandfather’s dream. He set us up and we are just continuing his quest, his vision.”
What Defines a Brat?
What better person to ask about bratwursts? Bratwursts (like the Usingers) are “a family, not just an item,” Usinger said.There are more than 40 different styles of bratwursts in Germany, and records of them date back to the 14th century. Generally speaking though, they are made using pork with a less coarse ground and often include veal.
“You get a very nice kind of fluffy product with the veal,” he said. They can be pre-cooked or raw—Usinger’s produces both—and they are great for grilling or frying.
Immigrants brought their regional favorites when they came to America. “A Bavarian brat is wider in diameter and looks like a white sausage, so pre-cooked. The end user just fries it to brown it or crisp it up,” Usinger explained.
Making a Brat
And the recipes? Of course, they weren’t going to tell me exactly. But the typical seasonings start with pepper and salt, and then an additional blend of any combination of some or all of these spices: mace, sage, nutmeg, coriander, ginger, garlic, and onion. Marjoram is a requirement for the Nürnberger bratwurst, a regionally protected variety, but in Wisconsin, it’s more likely to be found in a fresh kielbasa or Polish sausage, in Fritz Usinger’s experience.Usinger’s Bavarian-style brat with finely chopped pork and veal is the founder’s original recipe. A German sausage maker employed at Usinger’s in the late 1970s created a coarser ground raw brat, a style that has really gained popularity there as well as in other companies in the state. But the original was pre-cooked, which seemed to me something fast-paced modernity would have demanded.
“The white brat,” as Usinger calls the pre-cooked link, “was the most consumed brat. In the ‘50s and ’60s, you had a lot of Euro-immigrants and it was familiar. Over time, the demographics shifted a bit and the raw took over.” Raw brats likely came out of the small local meat markets. One just needed a grinder and a mixer, without needing the time, work, or equipment to pre-cook them: “Similar to East Coast Italian sausage places. They could make them fresh and grind them to be eaten the same day or next day.”
And this raw brat we’ve become accustomed to in Wisconsin is the “Sheboygan style,” said Usinger, a coarsely ground raw pork brat made for grilling, named for a city north of Milwaukee near the home of the mass-market Johnsonville brats. In Sheboygan, they call brat grilling a “brat fry” and they often eat them with ketchup.
Cooking a Brat
Ask any Wisconsinite, and you will likely be told the proper cooking of a brat is to parboil them—often in beer and perhaps with onions. Then, you grill or pan-fry them. Usinger gathers his patience for this.“Parboiling interferes with [the proper cooking]. Especially with onions and beer. God bless ‘em if they like to do it! But if you’re asking my opinion,” he said, “I am a purist. If I am cooking a fresh raw brat, it goes directly from the refrigerator to the grill.”
Parboiling a raw pork product seems wise—we have it drilled into our heads not to consume undercooked pork, and this surely prevents that. “But you are leaching some of the flavor out of the product,” Usinger said.
“I am a brat snob. When I grill at home, I have what I call the two-beer method. The time it takes for a middle-aged guy to drink two beers.”
Always pre-thaw the frozen meat and keep it refrigerated until ready. On a charcoal grill, wait for the coals to turn white, having burned off the lighter fluid, and give off a steady heat. Place the links on the perimeter of the grill to avoid rapidly heating the brat.
“The meat will expand too fast and rupture the natural casing skin, and you are losing that juice into the fire,” Usinger explained. That “juice” is melted fat carrying off the spices. “Allow them to acclimate to the heat of the grill. They gotta get comfortable. The two-beer method is low and slow. Use tongs to rotate them, not a fork!” This also prevents leaks in the casing, and, as Usinger warned, “There’s nothing worse than a dried-out brat.”
Start them at that edge, rotating them regularly with the tongs. As they start to change color from reddish pink to gray, start moving them toward the center of the heat, over the active coals, “still turning them frequently. Getting a little bit of browning, maybe plumping a bit,” Usinger instructed, “and when you feel they are hissing and plumped up, then you want to hit them with the high heat. Some like them charred. My wife likes them really crisped up.” Move them to the hottest part of the grill to finish up.
On a gas grill, you can start it empty with the lid on, take it down to low, and use the same method, “starting from the cooler spots into the warmer spots and raising the heat in increments until full-throttle at the end,” Usinger said. “And by that time, you’ve finished your two beers.”
Serving a Brat
As for fixings, many Wisconsinites like those beer-boiled onions, perhaps with some sauerkraut and hearty mustard, or ketchup in Sheboygan. Not Fritz Usinger—don’t bury the flavor of a good brat. For him, it’s just diced onions, “maybe diced tomatoes from your garden,” and a good bun. Not a puffy hot dog bun, but something with a good crust from a local bakery. “It’s the whole eating experience. You want to have a good bun.”Finally, he slices the brat lengthwise—butterflies it—and secures the onions in between the halves. If you’ve done your brat right, it’s still full of those flavorful juices. And, Usinger said, “The other thing the butterflying prevents is getting your mouth burned.”
Remember to include two beers on your ingredients list—just don’t boil them.
