From what I understand, having quizzed my wife over this bizarre and rather outlandish ritual that she always suggests....
You light the braai. You burn the wood up and add to it, until you have a lovely pile of smouldering embers that are just about ready to cook. Then some English country bint will amble over and offer you the el-cheapo £1 pack of cack Richmond sausages, as 'sacrificial' sausages. You will enquire as to the exact inference of her hitherto unnoticed purchase (we have three dogs - We
know when there are sausages in the house!), with as many expletives as you can muster.
She will then explain: When the braai is ready, you put the cheap sausages on first. They will burn to a horrid useless blackened crisp (which is considered perfect, if you prefer your barbecues in the British fashion), after which you then start cooking everything else. The point at which the sacrificial sausages burn is the point from which the barbecue is actually ready.... even though they'll burn just as well if the braai has only been lit for 2-3 minutes.....
Yeah.... summat like that... It's our ritual because she always suggests it, and I always decline, before going about and just cooking the things properly. I do end up putting the Richmonds on too, but they're then set aside to cool and get fed to the doggies!
To be fair, the wife is blonde... and foreign (from Kent, with a strong Danish heritage)... !!