Sanford : Media release - Sanford Announces Seafood Sausage Synergy

9 March 2023

Media release - for immediate use

Two Seafood Capitals of New Zealand Join Forces to

Create… a Sausage

We've all had a good beef sausage, and of course the classic pork, but if there's one sausage you never see lining the shelves, it's seafood. Until now that is.

Award winning butcher, Matthew Colvin from The Chopping Block local butchery in Coromandel has set out to create an extra-special range of bespoke sausages, the likes of which you've never had on your BBQ before.

The game-changing GreenshellTM mussel, garlic, onion and kelp, and the salmon, chili and chive sausages will be available at the Havelock Mussel and Seafood festival on the 11th of March, with all proceeds from these seafood saussies going to support the Kiwi Can programme which is run by the Graeme Dingle Foundation.

Making the perfect sausage from 100% seafood is no easy feat, many have tried most have failed.

When Matt was approached by his mate, Tom Leyland at Sanford to give it a try for charity, he thought it was worth taking on the challenge. This was before Cyclone Gabrielle blew in, making getting ingredients like the King salmon to Coromandel from Bluff in the South Island a logistical test. But it paid off with two new, delicious sausages from the sea.

Says Matt "It's something different, I've never made them before, never heard of them before, but the flavour really works. I don't know why people haven't approached it earlier."

Matt's no stranger to creating new sausage varieties, "I'm always mucking around with new flavours and bits and pieces." But a sausage made from seafood was an entirely new challenge, he says.

"I've never really done seafood. It's a bit tricky to work with. But still the same process, just chopping and changing until it tastes really good."

Matt kept experimenting with flavours, one small batch at a time, until he had two sausages he was proud of. The whole process took about six weeks, but that wasn't the end of it. He needed to make sure these sausages weren't just a hit with him and Tom, but could be festival-highlights. So out came the barbecue. Over a few sunny afternoons, family and friends all got to try the sensational salmon and munchable mussel sausages, and Matt took the feedback straight to his sausage laboratory at The Chopping Block.

"A few people around town have tasted them. Tom's had big barbies, bringing people around so there's been a lot of local people trying them, and we've ended up with the flavours everyone liked the best."

The end result? You'll have to taste for yourself. Six hundred of these seafood sizzlers are making their way around the Coromandel road closures before winding down to the Havelock Mussel and Seafood Festival on March 11. The Marlborough Sounds grows about 60% of the New Zealand supply of Greenshell mussels and the Havelock festival is all about celebrating the very best of Aotearoa's kai moana. So, what better way to celebrate than with a sausage seafood synthesis combining some of the best from the sea, from two of New Zealand's best seafood spots.

Or if you find yourself in Auckland, a special batch of the two new sausages will be sold to in-person customers from the Sanford and Sons fish monger at the Auckland Fish Market, starting this weekend (March 11) with all proceeds going to Kiwi Can.

Sanford and Sons manager, Alex Best hopes they'll be a hit. "They're something new. And if they do well, we might see about setting up something ongoing with The Chopping Block and make them a regular feature."

Alex says the sausages will be available fresh or frozen and only while stocks last.

***ENDS***

For a file of free-to-use images of the sizzling seafood sausages, please see this Dropbox folder

For more information please contact:

Fiona MacMillan

GM Corporate Communications, Sanford [e-mail]

[phone]

Above: Tom Leyland's two kids (Charlie, 2 and Athena, 3) take on the task of taste-testing with the mussels (left) and salmon (right) sausages.