Cotechino substitutes

The same seasoned pork and rind mixture stuffed into a boned pig's trotter instead of a casing. Sold beside cotechino wherever either is available.

Best for

lentils on New Year's Eve, bollito misto, with mashed potato or polenta

Effectively the same product, and the flavour and texture are the point rather than the shape. It is a little richer and gelatinous because the trotter skin contributes more collagen, and it is fiddlier to slice. Precooked vacuum-packed versions need only reheating in their bag in hot water for about twenty to thirty minutes.

The most available swap. Poach the whole sausages gently in water or stock for about thirty minutes rather than browning them, add the spices to the pot, and drop in a strip of pork rind or a small chunk of pancetta for body.

Best for

lentils and sausage, with polenta, New Year's Eve dinner, braised beans

Gives you the right savoury pork bulk but it is much leaner, firmer and drier, with no gelatinous silkiness at all, which is precisely what cotechino is bought for. Most Italian sausage is also fennel-forward, where cotechino leans on warm baking spices, so the pinch of nutmeg and clove matters more than it sounds. Do not prick the casings; the fat is what you are trying to keep in.

Unsmoked fresh pork sausage that is designed to be poached, which makes it a better structural match than most Italian sausage.

Best for

lentils, beans, cabbage, with mustard and boiled potatoes

Coarse fresh pork with mild marjoram and garlic seasoning, and it takes to a slow simmer without falling apart. It is leaner than cotechino and often noticeably tangy if it is the soured variety sold for Easter, which pushes the lentils in a Polish direction. Add nutmeg and a bay leaf and it lands close.

French cooking sausages made to be poached gently. Both hold together over a long simmer and both are richer than supermarket sausages.

Best for

lentils, with potatoes, braised cabbage, bollito style boiled dinners

Boudin blanc is very rich, pale and delicate, so it gives you the unctuous quality but tastes creamy and refined rather than rustic, and it can break up if boiled. Saucisse de Morteau has the right coarse chew but is definitely smoky, which pushes the lentils toward a Franco-German flavour that is delicious and clearly not Emilian.

Not a sausage at all, and arguably the best answer if what you want is the dish rather than the slice. A hock supplies exactly the gelatin, fat and pork flavour cotechino contributes to a pot of lentils.

Best for

lentils, bean stews, bollito misto, collar of a New Year's dinner

Simmer for about two hours with the aromatics until the meat pulls away, then shred it and add a pinch of nutmeg, clove and plenty of black pepper. The result is genuinely closer to cotechino's silky, gelatinous character than any lean sausage, and the broth is superb. What you lose is the sliced-sausage presentation, and the smoked hocks common in supermarkets bring smoke that cotechino does not have, so ask for fresh.

Two ingredients standing in for one: pancetta for the cured fat, salt and richness, plain fresh pork sausage for the meat.

Best for

lentils, beans, soups, greens

Render the pancetta first so the fat coats everything, then poach the sausages in the same pot. The dish comes out savoury and satisfying but reads more like lentil soup with bacon than like cotechino e lenticchie: saltier, faintly cured, and without the wobble. Cut the salt elsewhere in the recipe, since pancetta brings a lot.

The last resort, listed because it is what many people have and because it does at least fill the plate.

Best for

lentils, beans, weeknight substitution

Smoke is the one flavour cotechino conspicuously does not have, and it takes over a pot of lentils completely, so the dish tastes American or Cajun rather than northern Italian. It is also fully cooked and firm, so there is no gelatinous quality at all. Good food; just do not expect it to resemble the tradition.

Nothing meatless reproduces cotechino, and it is better to make a good lentil dish than a poor imitation. Cook the lentils in a soffritto of onion, carrot and celery with a bay leaf, a generous amount of olive oil, a Parmesan rind or a spoonful of white miso for savoury depth, and a pinch of the same nutmeg, clove and pepper.

Best for

vegetarian New Year's lentils, lentil side dishes

The result is genuinely good and tastes of the same spices, but there is no fat rendering into the pot and no gelatin, so the lentils are lighter and less silky. Finish with a hard glug of good olive oil off the heat to add back some richness, and call the dish lentils rather than cotechino e lenticchie.