[1] Although termed a sausage, no casing is used to hold the meat in shape, hence it is usually served as square slices from a formed block.

[3][4][5] This was long before Scottish comedian Tommy Lorne, after whom the sausage has been said to be named, became well-known: he was born in 1890.

The sausage is also an appropriate size to make a sandwich using a slice from a plain loaf of bread cut in half.

[2] Sausage meat (beef, pork or more usually a combination of the two) is minced with rusk and spices, packed into a rectangular tin with a cross-section of about ten centimetres (four inches) square, and sliced about one centimetre (one-half inch) thick before cooking.

[2] Occasionally, it has a length of caseless black pudding or haggis through the middle, in the style of a gala pie.