Oecher Puttes

Oecher puttes is a Westphalian blood sausage with a spicy flavor. A mixture of pork offal, fat, meat, and blood is spiced with marjoram, nutmeg, thyme, cloves, and pepper before the whole combination is stuffed into casings, smoked, and shaped into rings. The sausage is available both freshly produced and canned. Aachen's butchers prepare this cooked sausage specialty according to a 200-year-old recipe. It's often used as a part of Himmel und Erde, where the sausage is served fried with sides of stewed apples, potatoes, and onions, but it can also be served with mashed potatoes and sauerkraut (Kompes). Oecher Puttes is known even beyond the borders of Aachen, and to protect local sausagemakers against infringement, it has been registered as a protected product with the European Union.