All language subtitles for Inside.the.Factory.S04E03.Sausages.1080p.PMTP.WEB-DL.DDP5.1.H.264-BurCyg_track3_[eng]

The humble sausage.

Every year in the UK, we eat
a meaty three billion of them.

From coiled Cumberlands to
herby Lincolnshire and skinny

chipolatas--

There's no doubt about
it, we love our bangers.

Tonight, we follow the
production of traditional pork

sausages, from farm to
fork, via this rural factory

in North Yorkshire.

I'm Gregg Wallace.

Whoa!
Whoa!

Whoa!

Whoa!

I'm finding out how
the simple sausage--

That's a sausage superhighway.

- -is at technology's
cutting edge.

This is the first one
we're running in a factory.

Hey!

CHERRY HEALEY: I'm Cherry Healey

[groaning]

Slow and painful.

I want to know how to get
the best from our bangers,

and I'm discovering the secrets
of a favorite sausagy snack.

And the egg drops
into that sock of meat.

Is a meat sock
a technical term?

[laughter]

GREGG WALLACE: And
historian Ruth Goodman--

Oh!

Oh!

GREGG WALLACE: Learns
how a German bratwurst

became top dog in America.

So we're getting an early
association between sausage

dogs, dogs and sausages.

Every week, this
factory produces more

than four million sausages.

And this is the
delicious story of how they

put the sizzle into every one.

Welcome to "Inside
the Factory."

[theme music]

This is the Heck Sausage Factory
in Ripon, North Yorkshire.

It's the largest independent
sausage company in Britain.

22,000 square feet
and 101 workers

all dedicated to one of our
favorite traditional foods.

Over a year, they turn out what
would be a string of sausages

nearly 13,000 miles long.

That would stretch from
here to Honolulu and back.

They make 17 different
types of premium bangers,

including chicken and chorizo.

But tonight, we're
following the production

of their 97% pork variety.

Is that good?

That's very good.

OK, thank you.

And pork comes from pigs.

Most British pigs are
born and reared indoors.

But to get a close-up look,
Cherry's at a farm in Suffolk

where the piglets
are bred outside.

17,000 of them a year.

Hi, Jonathan.

Hello.

I've never seen
anything like this.

Jonathan Green has been
working with pigs for 25 years.

They've all got their little
houses and their courtyards

and their feeding troughs.

It's like a little town.

Yes.

On this field alone, there
are 750 sows and their babies.

CHERRY HEALEY: Jonathan
and other large-scale pig

farmers use cross-breeding for
the best commercial results.

What breed are these pigs?

These sows are Landrace-Duroc
crosses chosen for heartiness.

So you get the
combination of a hearty,

a sow having large litters.

And we use the Hampshire
boars because they

give us good muscles,
good meats in the carcass.

CHERRY HEALEY: This sow
is about two years old,

and this is her fourth litter.

All right, should we
play count the piglet?

Oh, look.

Oh, mommy's showing me her sign.

Oh, go away.

[laughs]

They're four days old, and
they're already running around

and are really strong.

Over the next five weeks,
they'll double in weight,

and they'll look like this.

Then they'll be moved on.

When will they leave the farm?

They will leave
the farm tomorrow.

Tomorrow?

Yes.

Where will they go tomorrow?

They will go to a farm
and be raised indoors

for 22, 23 weeks on that farm.

CHERRY HEALEY:
And then they go--

To be made into sausages.

Sausages.

Yeah.

Is it more cost effective
to take them indoors?

Very much more cost
effective because to rear

them outdoors running around
in this cold environment,

their food conversion's
not very good at all.

Because they're burning
off lots of energy--

Yes.

- -protecting
themselves from the cold.

Yes.

[music playing]

When they leave here, they'll go
onto a diet that will grow them

in such a way as that they
have lots of lean growth,

but not excessive fat growth,
because people don't want

to eat too much fat, but
they want a little bit of fat

for the succulence in the meat.

CHERRY HEALEY: They'll go to
an abattoir at about six months

old, the same age in
size as these pigs

who are staying on
Jonathan's farm to breed.

Look how curious they are.

Hello.

How does it make you feel
to see your pigs go off?

It's part of the business that
you're in, is to produce meat.

You look after them
as well as you can,

but I don't get
attached to them, no.

I'm getting attached now.

Oh, my God, they're
biting my boot.

About 30% of the meat on a
pig is suitable for sausages.

That'll be the
shoulder cuts, the belly,

and perhaps some from the neck.

It's a lot.

It is a lot, yes.

It's a huge amount.

GREGG WALLACE: Nothing on
a pig is wasted at all.

The loin is used for chops.

The ham for ham.

What about something
like the snout or the ears?

Well, the ears
and the trotters

will probably go to China
because they're delicacies.

CHERRY HEALEY: No
part is wasted.

GREGG WALLACE: No.

Snout to tail,
nothing is wasted.

They're fighting
over your welly boot

because they all want to have
a nibble of your welly boot.

Yep, and my coat.

Do they-- will they
just eat anything?

[laughter]

Oh, pick me up, yeah.

I mean, it was inevitable.

You know what?

If you kneel in a field of
pigs, that's gonna happen.

It is, it is.

Yeah.

[music playing]

GREGG WALLACE: The
pork shoulders are

taken to commercial butchers.

One of them is a family
firm in Consett near Durham.

Whoa!

You go through how
many shoulders a day?

3,000 to 4,000.

That's immense.

Yes.

GREGG WALLACE:
Commercial director Jack

Young checks them for quality.

They've got a good
bit of solid lean meat

there, decent amount
of fat coverage

there, but not too much.

What's a shoulder got that
makes it good for sausages

that a belly wouldn't?

A pork shoulder is
about 80% lean, 20% fat,

and that gives you a good
mix for a solid sausage.

GREGG WALLACE: These
super-sized shoulders

are about twice as big as the
ones in your local butcher's.

Arr, Jim Ladd, ha-ha arr!

[laughter]

I'm on it like a car bonnet.

So I hang on to the leg
here, hook it somewhere-- oh.

Oh, that's a slippery one.

Our countdown to sausages--

- Whoa!
- -begins.

There's something wrong
with your hook there.

It just slipped off.

All right?

There are up to 28
butchers at work

here deboning and
preparing the meat.

They're protected by chain mail.

[music playing]

A 21st century stainless steel
version of medieval battle

dress.

I'm dressed up.

Can I get a knife?

Not a chance, no.

No?

100% no.

GREGG WALLACE: Tony Laws
is head of production.

So this is real butchery?

This is very
skilled people here,

yeah, working with dangerous
machines and dangerous,

obviously, implements.

GREGG WALLACE: Each
knife is numbered

and allocated to a butcher who
must keep it perfectly sharp.

What do you have to
do-- take out the bone,

take off the skin, take out
all the bits you don't need.

First two gentlemen
take the rib cage off.

Boy, what's happening here?

That's an open-top de-rinder.

It's a very dangerous machine.

You've got to be very skilled
to do this, I'll tell you.

Wow!

Wow!

There's a blade there.

That's a big blade.

Whoa, whoa!

That's a bit all the
way across that way.

GREGG WALLACE: The razor
sharp points on the roller

pull the meat onto the blade,
which strips off the skin.

He's the only one not
dressed up in chainmail.

Well, you can't wear
one of these chainmail

because he's got
teeth on this machine,

so that would grab
you and take you in.

So you can't have on here.

GREGG WALLACE: The skin can
be made into pork scratchings

or sold to other factories
for budget sausages.

Brilliant.

The most skilled
butchers work alone.

TONY LAWS: This is
the fastest model.

570 in a day.

All I just saw was a
blur of arms and knife.

The rest are on the pace line.

They have about
10 seconds to cut

away their part of the shoulder
as it moves along the conveyor.

When I'm not here,
do you play music?

Yes.

You do?

I like ABBA when
I'm deboning meat.

ABBA doesn't make
you debone faster.

You want something loud
and something beating,

you know what I mean?

You have AC/DC?

Yes.

[music playing]

GREGG WALLACE: From the first
to the last man on the line,

it takes just one minute to
completely debone a joint.

And this line will do
2,000, 2,500 a day.

Fabulous.

Fabulous.

Do you know what?

I thought this would
all be, like, machine.

I didn't think I'd find a
line of skilled butchers.

Every animal is
totally different.

Yeah, you don't make
animals in a machine.

TONY LAWS: Yes,
everyone's different.

GREGG WALLACE: The
shoulder blade comes out

and the ball socket.

Then a lean cut of meat
named for its shape.

Leg of mutton cut on a pig?

Every animal's got one, see?

Every animal's
got a leg of mutton.

TONY LAWS: Yeah.

It's solid, solid, pure meat.

That's a big steak.

TONY LAWS: Yeah.

GREGG WALLACE: It's only used
in skinny ranges of sausages.

There's not enough fat
on it to make a sausage.

TONY LAWS: Some people like
more meat, all this health kick,

no more fat.

Yeah, you need a bit of fat.

Course you do.

It's a sausage!

The next butcher, he
takes all the glands off,

any bits of gristle
that's been left on.

GREGG WALLACE: The average
shoulder has enough meat

for around 100 sausages.

Is this now finally
our sausage meat?

TONY LAWS: It certainly is.

Well, hang on a minute.

We've taken quite a bit off.

I mean, we started off
with, what, 12, 14 kilos?

Yeah.

What've we got now, 4?

4, 4 and 1/2, yes.

Nothing gets wasted, though.

Even the bones.

The bones get taken away.

They get boiled and they get
put in lipsticks, mascaras,

anything with animal fat in it.

Wine, gums.

- That's where you get it from.
- Whoa, whoa, whoa.

Whoa, whoa, whoa.

Well, you don't wear
mascara, so you're all right.

One minute.

Lipstick you do.

[laughter]

I'll say it.

- Thank you so much, mate.
- No problem.

Honestly, I mean that.

Thank you so much.

These workers slice their
way through a pallet

of shoulders every 10 minutes.

Then the meat for our
sausages is vacuum-packed

and dispatched on the same day.

The pork shoulders from the
butcher's have traveled just

over an hour down
into North Yorkshire,

and they've arrived
at our factory.

Where every day, they make
around 625,000 bangers.

[beeping]

The intake area receives a
steady supply of fresh meat

from 7:00 AM to 5:00 PM,
overseen by Jack Tate.

Is this the pork shoulder?

- This is it, yeah.
- Brilliant.

OK.

All right, how do we get it off?

20 of these one-ton
meaty mountains

come into the factory every day.

Test your driving skills.

It's 38 minutes since
sausage production

began at the butchers.

I just need to
check the temperature,

make sure it's all OK.

Jack, I can tell you
what the temperature is.

It's cold, mate.

JACK TATE: Sitting
around two degrees.

- GREGG WALLACE: That's good?
- Spot on.

Better get on
with it, haven't we?

JACK TATE: Yeah.

We need to grab
you some seasoning.

- What's that, a mix?
- It's for us, yeah.

Do you know what's in it?

Salt, pepper, a
little bit of ginger,

little bit of coriander in
there, and preservative.

I'll tell you what, let's
not bother with it, thanks.

I don't like coriander.

[laughter]

[grunts]

The factory gets
through 1,000 kilos

of herbs and spices every day.

That's it.

We just need to go
grab some frozen pork.

Whoa, that is super cold!

Super, super cold.

[grunting]

Oh, that is freezing!

What temperature
is that freezer?

About -18.

GREGG WALLACE: Why
have you got a load

of fresh and some frozen?

That's to help with
temperature control.

As the pork's going through the
machines, they tend to heat up,

and it's just to help with
keeping the temperature down.

GREGG WALLACE: OK.

Is that it?

JACK TATE: That's your lot.

So to make sausages, just the
pork shoulder, just seasoning.

That's it.

Thank you very
much indeed, Jack.

I'll take it from here.

Yeah.

Right, I'm coming, I'm coming!

[music playing]

I'm taking these
ingredients along the length

of the building and
into the first stage

of production-- mixing.

You, I suppose, are Misha.

I am, yes.

And you are in
charge of all of this?

Yeah.

Let's get some
frozen meat flicked.

You got a box.

Can you manage?

[laughs]

I'm strong as an ox, me.

The workers wear hygienic
head covers and layer

up underneath because the
factory is kept at a chilly 4

degrees C for meat safety.

This is Vadim.

He works in this area.

Right.

This is the pork that I
saw at the deboning place.

It's just-- it's just
the frozen stuff, right?

MISHA: It is, yeah.

So we put it in there to
flick it into little bits

so that when we put
them in to be mixed

it doesn't break the machine.

Oh!

Hey!

They must be very
strong, fast blades.

Yeah, very strong.

I think that's lovely.

You're making little
Gammon steaks.

Yeah.

GREGG WALLACE:
What do we do now?

MISHA: Right.

So this goes over
to the bowl chopper.

The what?

The bowl chopper.

Bowl chopper?

Bowl chopper, yeah.

It's a big bowl.

I'll push it
straight onto there.

Go on.

There.

So in mixing the meat
together, this big bowl spins.

So it's moving the meat
round whilst those blades

are chopping.

GREGG WALLACE: So
the arm stays static.

MISHA: Yeah.

GREGG WALLACE: Ah!

We're using 97% shoulder meat.

But legally, a pork sausage can
contain just 42% meat, which

could include skin and fat.

Rusk can make up the rest.

MISHA: The blades are
now chopping up the meat.

GREGG WALLACE: In here is 50%
fresh and 50% frozen pork.

I always stop.

Why do you stop?

Why'd you stop?

Next what we need to do
is put in the seasonings.

Seasoning?
MISHA: Yeah.

The stuff I got
earlier, right?

Yeah, that's right.

[music playing]

Is there no way
of doing this quick?

Unless you want a rubbish
sausage, that's how we do it.

Yeah!

[laughs] I love the sudden
waterfall of sausage.

I love that.

After 15 minutes
of mixing, we've

got a 150-kilo batch of
roughly-minced seasoned meat.

Where's this go, Misha?

Just on here.

You're gonna need
to push it hard.

So that is going up there, so
you're gonna have to lift it.

Yeah, get out.

What button do I push?

This button here.

GREGG WALLACE: This will
become 2,250 sausages.

The meat moves down
the giant funnel.

At the bottom,
it's finely minced,

and any remaining gristle
or cartilage is removed.

MISHA: The meat gets pushed
through these little holes.

And anything that does
not fit in those holes,

this swipes it round
into this hole.

That is brilliant.

We're in the factory's
filling area,

ready to turn 150
kilos of pork mince

into their best-selling bangers.

They have machines to
put their sausage meat

into skins, but supervisor
Misha is showing me

how it used to be done--

by hand.

Looks easy.

All we've got to do is
hold the end, right?

[music playing]

Hang on a minute.

Who on Earth is gonna
want a 20-yard sausage?

So you knot it after.

GREGG WALLACE: Oh!

Look at that.

Do you reckon you
could do it that fast?

GREGG WALLACE: No.

I think I can do that bit.

I have no idea what's
happening with that bit.

That is amazing.

Right.

Let's limber up, right?

It's using the button there.

It's pressing it here, right?

Yeah, that's correct.

GREGG WALLACE: Whoa!
Whoa!

Whoa!

[laughs] Should I try again?

Yes.

You're letting go of
the skins too quickly.

That's it.

GREGG WALLACE: Filling a
sausage requires precise meat

flow, speed, and pressure.

Oh!

All at the same time.

Oh, that's better.

That's the best
you've done so far.

Right.

And now I've got to
try and knot it, right?

MISHA: Yeah.

[music playing]

I can't do it.

I mean, I literally
cannot do it.

Oh!

MISHA: [laughs]
That is really bad.

GREGG WALLACE: Our
batch of 2,250 sausages

will need over 280
meters of skin.

That's nearly 5 times the
height of the Tyne Bridge.

What is this?

MISHA: It's a collagen skin.

Made out of what?

This is beef hide.

GREGG WALLACE: Weren't
they traditionally

made from-- from intestine?

Yeah, they did
used to be guts,

but this makes the consistency
of the sausage better.

GREGG WALLACE: Even a
sausage-filling expert can only

make 1,500 of them an hour.

And this factory needs to
work 24 times faster than that

to keep up with orders.

So this machine is making
600 sausages per minute.

No way.
MISHA: Yeah.

A minute?
A minute?

Not an hour.

MISHA: A minute.

The sausage meat is
inside those tubes.

Yeah.

The metal tubes.

You call them horns, right?

MISHA: Horns, yeah.

And that horn is constantly
pushing sausage meat out.

Yeah.

GREGG WALLACE: The skin is
loaded onto the hollow horn,

which starts spinning.

The meat is pushed through
the middle and into the skin,

creating one long
rotating sausage.

So there's horns
on the machine

so it can reload really quickly.

GREGG WALLACE:
This is it, right?

Here we go.

Skin on the top.

That one will get to the end.

Spins it round.

Genius stuff!

Then two silicone belts grip
the sausage between them.

A quick pinch as the
sausage is spinning

creates a twist every
12.5 centimeters.

How good is that?

That is very efficient
sausage-making.

It's a bit faster than your,
uh, sausage-making, isn't it?

I would have
caught up eventually.

[laughter]

It's brilliant.

What's this bit doing?

This is cutting them.

GREGG WALLACE: The
linked sausages

are pulled into
the cutter, which

has three spinning blades.

They slice and separate them
at a rate of 2,000 a minute.

That's a sausage superhighway.

In just one hour
and nine minutes,

we've made bumper
to bumper sausages.

But what's the best way to cook
them for the fullest flavor?

CHERRY HEALEY: I'm heading
to the University of Chester

to run an experiment with food
scientist Dr. Stewart Ferryman.

Dr. Stew.

Hey, Cheery.

How do you cook
the perfect sausage?

STEWART FERRYMAN:
Very good question.

We're gonna put
them to the test.

[music playing]

Cherry, first off we're
gonna do a long, slow fry

for 25 minutes.

CHERRY HEALEY: And is
there a trick to it?

Plenty of oil.

Keep it turning.

Don't let it go black.

So it's quite a
high-maintenance method.

It is.

OK.

STEWART FERRYMAN:
Oh, smells so good.

CHERRY HEALEY: The next
batch go in the oven.

170 degrees C for 25 minutes.

Give them a flip
halfway through.

CHERRY HEALEY: I like
doing it this way.

It's very lazy.

You put them in a
pan, boom, done.

Our final set, head
under the grill.

So what is the secret to cooking
sausages under the grill?

We're getting them on
there for 15 minutes,

and like when you're
frying, you need

to turn them to make sure that
they're brown all over and.

The brown is a
secret to the flavor.

Oh, it's such a
thing of beauty.

STEWART FERRYMAN: And there
you can see the fat drips down.

More fat in the pan and less
in your tummy, whereas actually

you can see with the frying pan
it's all right there, isn't it?

In their different ways, all
our sausages are browning

up, developing their flavor.

STEWART FERRYMAN:
What's going on

is a very important reaction
called the Maillard reaction.

And on the surface, you
can see it's Browning,

and that's the
reaction taking place.

When it gets hot, the building
blocks of the proteins

called the amino acids
react with traces of sugar,

and they produce thousands
of different chemicals.

There are ones that
give it meaty flavors,

and you can kind of get
nutty, caramelly flavors.

It's what makes it taste good.

CHERRY HEALEY: We're dividing
up our cooked sausages

and giving some of
each type to the lab

to measure their fat content,
moistness, and texture.

Wow.

Slow and painful.

We've also asked 10
sausage fans to rate

them in a controlled
taste experiment.

It's a blind test, so
they don't know how

each sausage has been cooked.

Good day to you, Sophia.

Hello.

So which was your
favorite sausage?

418.

CHERRY HEALEY: Why was that?

I love barbecued
sausage, and I

love it when they're
all brown and quite dark

color on the outside.

Rob, you've left the
most mouse-like portion

of sausage on each plate.

I just kept trying
bits and bits.

It's so wonderfully unusual.

This one I liked, 539.

But to be fair, they were
all very nice sausages.

There's got to be a winner.

I think it was
that one, but who

doesn't like a good sausage?

CHERRY HEALEY: Hi, Jenny.

Hello.

Which was the sausage for you?

Definitely that one.

Every side is brown.

I do like my
sausages to be brown.

That is your one true love.

It is, 418.

CHERRY HEALEY: Our testers
419, slow-fried sausage,

as their favorite, with
a score of 76 out of 100.

Can science explain
why it came out on top?

The lab results are in,
and here we have the texture

analysis of the sausage.

That was the cutting
through the sausage,

so it gives us an idea of
how soft, how juicy it is.

Grey is the fried, and you
can see the fried one needs

about half the force
to cut through it

compared to the other two ways.

So the fried is
softer and will give

you a more succulent sausage.

Why is it so much softer?

The surface hasn't dried out.

It had oil over
it the whole time.

Whereas the other two ways, they
were drying ways of cooking,

and so it's got drier and a bit
tougher on the outside as well.

It has a lot more
fat in it, though.

So if we go to the
next results, here's

the percentage of fats in the
different kinds of sausage.

So when you compare
the fried sausage

to the oven and the grilled,
that difference in fat is huge.

Is a lot of the
flavor in the fat?

Yes.

The fat conveys a lot of
those flavor molecules.

And also there are fat-sensitive
taste receptors in the mouth.

Kind of "melt in your mouth"?

The tasters confirmed that
the fried has a better texture.

And in terms of overall
liking, they loved the fried

much more than the other two.

CHERRY HEALEY: Frying might
not be the healthiest option,

but our tests
confirm it delivers

flavor from your sausage.

I'll just take one for the road.

So it seems that
low and slow frying

all the way if you
want to get the most

flavor from your banger.

It does take more work.

But like most things
in life, good things

come to those that wait.

[music playing]

GREGG WALLACE: In
this rural factory,

there are 37,000
sausages an hour

heading into the packing area.

It's the biggest
part of the building,

with an average of 32
workers across 4 lines.

Sausage production is an
hour and 10 minutes in,

and they're ready to be packed.

Let's see how you
get on with this.

OK.

Oh, you're gonna
need some of these.

GREGG WALLACE:
Looks like a giggle.

You're welcome,
you're welcome.

What do we have-- thank you.

Thank you very much.

- This is Solace.
- Solace.

SOLACE: Yes.

If you were my brother,
you'd be Solace Wallace.

Solace Wallace.

Oh, nice.

Yeah!

[music playing]

I've been to many factories
that are almost fully automated,

so it's unusual to see so
many people hand-packing.

For crying out loud, you have
the world fast here, don't you?

Yeah.

GREGG WALLACE: The machine
is shooting out 600 sausages

a minute, and we're
packing 10 at a time

for the family-size pack.

[groaning]

Put nice.

What do you mean, put nice?

MISHA: Solace is very
good with his sausages.

That thing there is called
the sausage separator.

Solace actually
created that himself.

No way!

Why did you make a
sausage separator?

Oh, better system.

Easier sausage.

GREGG WALLACE: There
used to be workers only

on one side of the conveyor.

Then Solace drew up his
invention on a beer mat,

and the factory got it made.

As a result, they've
doubled their packing rate.

What was your job in Lithuania?

Mechanic.

Mechanic?

Oh, I see.

That's fantastic.

Faster sausages coming down.

Oh!

Georgetta, she's one
of our best packers.

GREGG WALLACE: Is
your surname Sausage?

Georgetta Sausage?

Not quite, but
I will change it.

And what do I have to do
to be a good sausage packer?

You have to--

to want to work.

If you don't want to work
here, you can't be it.

Do you ever sing
songs on the line?

Yeah, we always sing
songs on the line.

GREGG WALLACE: The butchers
who deboned our pork

liked working to hard rock.

What is the best music
to pack sausages?

Disco music.

Disco!

[music playing]

What is the most spoken
language in this factory?

Russian.

Russian?

GREGG WALLACE: What other
nationalities do we have here?

Latvia, Lithuania,
Polish people.

Yeah, and I'm from Romania.

What is the
Romanian for sausage?

[romanian]

[romanian]

[music playing]

The company is growing
fast and trying new ways

of speeding up production,
including testing

this prototype packing robot.

This machine is the
first one of its type

to be running in a factory.

Really?

Yeah.

So it makes all of
our packing automatic.

The sausages go
into the machine,

collecting them into sixes,
passing them along and putting

them into the trays on its own.

I see.

It will be able to pack
1,800 sausages a minute,

40% quicker than by hand.

Hey!

Packs of sausages.

It's amazing.

GREGG WALLACE: The company
says better productivity

means they'll be
able to allocate

the packers to other areas.

But there's one tradition
that won't change.

[bell ringing]

Why'd you build this factory
so close to the airport?

Every day, the whole factory
stops for lunch together.

What are we gonna
have for lunch?

- Sausages.
- No way.

Yeah.

GREGG WALLACE (VOICEOVER):
At 4 degrees C,

it feels like we've been
working in a giant fridge.

Oh, it's warm.

It's nice and warm.

Yeah.

Can I have three
sausages please?

Of course you can.

You're a Corsican?

Of course you can.

Of course you can,
of course you can.

Way, I am hungry.

Give me a factory canteen
and a traditional lunch,

and I'm happy.

I'll eat sausages with anything.

I've always
wondered, how do you

get an egg inside a scotch egg?

And that's not the only mystery.

No one knows who invented them.

One theory is that
Fortnum & Mason created

them for rich coach travelers.

Another, that they
were developed

from an early Indian dish
called nargisi kofta.

One thing's for certain--

we love them.

The biggest scotch egg factory
in the UK is in Lincolnshire.

That's a lot of eggs.

Production starts with 20,000
pre-shelled hard boiled eggs

being checked over
by Andy Dawson.

Hi, Andy.

Hi, there.

There is something weird
about a big bag of eggs.

ANDY DAWSON: Bit strange, yes.

Gotta put it into the
[inaudible] first of all.

Oh, wow!

Oh!

That is really good fun.

They almost look like ping
pong balls or golf balls.

ANDY DAWSON: Golf
balls, isn't it?

And wait.

You need to use the ladle.

Any ones that are defective,
we'll take out here.

We're looking for egg shells.

We're looking for smaller eggs,
broken eggs like that one.

Pull them out.

Yeah, pull them out.

And then they go
into the bottom.

What happens is
the waste eggs?

They get used
again for mayonnaise.

So nothing gets wasted.

No, nothing gets wasted.

CHERRY HEALEY:
What happens next?

These are moved
along the egg steppers,

and then they get dropped
into a little hole there.

And that's where
the meat comes in.

I feel like this is
where the magic is.

A red laser checks
if an egg is there.

Then a piston pushes it
into a tube of sausage meat.

The meat basically
forms a sock,

and the egg drops into
that sock of meat.

CHERRY HEALEY: A meat sock?

Is a meat stock
a technical term?

No, not really.

[laughs]

CHERRY HEALEY: The
meat sock twists

and seals the top and bottom.

It takes just three
seconds to wrap an egg.

They start out oval, but
tumbling off multiple conveyors

rolls them into a
spherical shape.

ANDY DAWSON: It goes
into the batter machine.

Woo!

Is that a batter waterfall?

ANDY DAWSON: Just
flour and water.

That's fabulous.

[music playing]

The egg parcels
drop onto a conveyor

slide filled with crumbs.

And as they roll,
they get covered.

What is a crumb made out of?

Depending on the customer,
we have different ones

where tortilla crumb.

Tortilla?
ANDY DAWSON: Tortilla crumb.

Oh, my God.

Then we also have seeded
bread that goes on certain ones.

CHERRY HEALEY: So you could put
almost anything on the crumb.

ANDY DAWSON: Anything.

Anything you life.

They look much more
like a Scotch egg now.

So how many of
these do you make?

Approximately, average,
1.4 million a week.

CHERRY HEALEY: That's
around 74 million Scotch

eggs made here every year.

Who eats all those Scotch eggs.

British summertime,
everybody loves them.

CHERRY HEALEY: Now
covered in bread crumbs,

they enter the fryer
for about seven minutes.

Oh, they're so beautiful.

Fresh out the fryer.

Yep.

Can I crack one open?

Go for it.

Oh, that is a lovely thing.

So there we go.

The mystery of the
Scotch egg is solved,

and it's all down
to amazing machines

and the magic of a meat sock.

GREGG WALLACE: An
hour and 20 minutes

after we began making
sausages, and our porky parcels

have reached the ceiling
section at the end of the line.

Misha, explain to me please
what happens in here.

So this is wrapping
them, so it's

putting a film around them.

You see the arms.

They grab the
trays, and then it's

pushed off onto a hot plate.

And the hot plate melts a little
bit of plastic on the top.

That is how they come
out, heat shield.

That is the film
that's so satisfying to--

Pop, yeah.

Yeah, Yeah, Yeah,
Yeah, Yeah, Yeah.

Now they have to go through
a series of safety checks.

Every tray of sausages
passes under a detector

to make sure no metal has
slipped into the meat.

Why is it going so fast?

It's like-- it's
like a toboggan ride.

Is that the end of
the production line?

MISHA: It is for this room.

Thank you, Misha.

You're very welcome.

I never knew there was
so much to a sausage.

There's still one
more test to go,

and it happens in the canteen.

Hello.

Do you do the
quality check, right?

- You're in the right place.
- Yeah.

Hi, Isabel.

Right.

What do we have to
do to check quality?

Well, first thing is make
sure that it's sealed properly.

And it's properly sealed.

Then the next thing is to smell.

How many sausages do you
smell in the course of a day?

More than I ever
thought I would.

The sausages are weighed
and then shallow fried.

That's a mildly
seasoned, mildly spiced,

very meaty, bouncy sausage.

I think that's
exactly as it should be.

The interesting thing is that
you say it's mild, because it's

quite strong seasoning, but
because these are literally

fresh off the line, they haven't
had time to kind of develop.

So it'll be a couple of days
before they hit the shelves.

They'll get stronger flavor?

Yeah.

Ah.

Brilliant.

Thank you very much.

ISABEL: You're very welcome.

[music playing]

Traditional bangers like these
are the best-sellers in the UK,

but in the US they're
partial to a hot dog.

But just how American are they?

[music playing]

A red sausage in a white
bun with mustard over the top.

It's an American icon.

But it turns out it didn't
originate in the USA.

American food anthropologist
Kaori O'Connor

has invited me to
sample the sausage

that led to the hot dog.

Oh, yummy.

Look at that.

- Oh, they look nice.
- Whoa, yes.

They do look nice.
Thank you.

Yes, yes.

So where exactly did the
hot dog really come from?

From the distant
past, by way of Germany.

What we've got here is the
classic bratwurst-- very finely

processed, mild sausages.

One of the great things
about these sausages,

they're so mild that
they're very adaptable.

So how do we get
them from this sort

of German-style sausage to
what we think of as a hot dog,

always--

and it's always-- in a bun?

This is how-- this is the
father of the American dog,

Charles Feldman.

WOMAN: Feldman was one
of hundreds of thousands

of German immigrants
who sailed into New York

in the 19th century.

KAORI O'CONNOR: He arrives
in New York about 1856.

He's young, he's 15, and
he has to make a living.

What's he gonna do?

He thinks-- food, fast food.

Now, in Germany the
sausage has been

a street food from before
there were streets, you know?

He said, well, there
are these sausages.

What can I do to make
them more attractive?

And he thought, I can
put them in a bun.

It's really easy.

And he would slash
open the bun, put

in a warm hot dog, put on some
mustard, and there you are.

He sold them at Coney Island,
which is the big resort.

WOMAN: So it's a
sort of holiday food.

It's cheap.

KAORI O'CONNOR: Yeah.

The Coney Island Red Hot.

And it was the fact that it
was hot that sort of first

captured the imagination.

OK, yes.

A cold sausage is one
thing, but a hot sausage--

yeah, it's much more appealing.

That explains half the
name we know today,

but what about the other half?

Whoa, look at that.

When was the first
reference to a hot dog?

We scoured the archives,
and one of the earliest

is here, "The Patterson
Daily Press," 1892.

And it's a young boy who is so
keen to get his hands on it.

He says, Hey Mister,
give me a hot dog quick!

WOMAN: The dog part
can probably be traced

back to a popular German pet.

One of the things the
Germans brought over

was their dogs, notably the
dachshund or sausage dog.

So we're getting
an early association

between sausage dogs--

KAORI O'CONNOR: Dog and dog.

- -dogs and sausages.

Because you see, the
sausage is long and narrow,

and so was the dachshund.

So that's it then, the hot
dog, all elements assembled.

You don't need much,
do you, to make us happy?

This is perfect.

[music playing]

GREGG WALLACE: At the
factory, the sausages

have passed quality
check with flying colors.

And they're ready
to be boxed up.

Are you Harry?

Yes, nice to meet.

GREGG WALLACE: So
what happens here?

This is the sleeving side, so
you want to grab some of these?

Oh, I'm doing it, am I?

Yeah, you can give me
a hand if you'd like.

All right, OK.

Harry's been sleeving
sausages for two years.

So with your finger,
you can prop it

against your hip like
that and then push

it with your finger like that.

And all you have to do is grab
a pack and then just slide

it in, just like that.

That's not difficult.
HARRY: And then just pop it--

I can do--
I can do this.

We have just 4 minutes to sleeve
175 packs before the next batch

rolls off the line.

Cannot get these things
to fold up quick enough.

How many packs are you doing
in the course of a day?

HARRY: In a day, it's
tens of thousands.

Oh, my word.

They won't stop coming
along, will they?

I can't-- I can't do it.

The fast pace is
set by the sausage

packers on the production line.

You can't stop here, really.

What can go wrong?

If the sausages all
fall on the floor,

which is what I
don't really want.

But we're doing it.

We're getting in front.

Gimme, gimme,
gimme, gimme, gimme.

Look, this is good.

This is really good.

We've eventually caught up.

This is a job that is easy to
do but very hard to do quickly.

Now the packs are date stamped
for a 10-day shelf life

and put in display cases of 6.

I can keep up with this.

It's this here
that fascinates me.

So that's a box strapper.

Box strapper?

Box strapper.

GREGG WALLACE: What's your name?
Len.

My name is--

yeah.

Great.

That's good.
Let me do it.

Let me do it.

Let me do it.

And try it.

Good.

You must have
trapped your finger in.

You not lost your finger.

Show me.

It's got a sensor.

It's working.

It's safe.

Oh, your hands have--

Oh, Yeah.

It's OK.

It's OK!

[laughter]

[music playing]

I've got it.

It's been just 2
hours and 28 minutes

since our pork
shoulders were deboned,

and we've made it
to the final stage--

distribution.

You must be Izzy, right?

Hi, Gregg.

Nice to meet you.
I'm Izzy.

You're in charge
of distribution.

I am.

So we have about
five lorries that

load onto the dock each day.

GREGG WALLACE: How many
pallets on each lorry?

IZZY: So we usually get
about 26 to 28 pallets.

So you're looking at about
10,000 sausages per pallet.

10,000 sausages per pallet?

Per pallet.

So if you look
down the lorry now,

we've got roughly
170,000 sausages there.

That's a lot of sausages.

[music playing]

GREGG WALLACE: These chilled
bangers will be on the shelves

of 10,000 British
supermarkets within two days,

and more are bought in
London than anywhere else.

I've enjoyed watching
the sausages being made,

and I am pleased
that they actually

contain so few ingredients.

But I am surprised that it's
still really a people industry.

It requires enthusiastic
and highly-skilled people,

especially in the butchery.

But really what
they're making is

something that we've
all enjoyed for hundreds

and hundreds of years.

That is a sausage.