rookworst

Rookworst (; smoked sausage) or Gelderse rookworst is a type of Dutch sausage in which ground meat is mixed with spices and salt and stuffed into a casing. Having the shape of a ring bologna, it is common in the Netherlands and is also exported to Great Britain. The basis for Gelderse rookworst is metworst, or lean pork. Traditionally, rookworst is made with pork, stuffed in a small pig intestine and smoked over smouldering chips of oak and beechwood. This traditional rookworst is usually sold in butcher shops.

It is assumed that rookworst from the province of Gelderland started to make waves in the Netherlands in the eighteenth century. The cookbook De Volmaakte Gelderse Keuken-Meid (1756) gives detailed instructions on how to use oak or beech wood to smoke sausage in the chimney or smoking room. Gelderland, the only province that had ample access to such wood, became most famous for its smoked sausage. Around 1900, almost every farmer smoked his own slaughter in the chimney. There were also many pig farms in the province at the time.