Aloha everyone
Havent been on the forum for awhile. Moved back home to Hawaii and lost contact with the world. I need some help with some dry curing sausage. Has any one on the forum dry cured sausage or salame? (dry curing is new to me)
I know that a cure could be made of salt, sugar and garlic. Question? Do you just mix this mixture with the meat, remove the meat from your cure and add your spices after?
I know there are several cures on the market but, I am trying to get the most practical and not trying to kill my family with the wrong cure.
Any help would really be great!!!! ::)
Mahalo and Aloha
Kamano
I'm probably the wrong one to be answering this, but the sausage recipe that I'm going to try (close to my family's old recipe), calls for Salt, Pepper, Sugar, and cure/insta cure/cure #1/Prague Powder. My recipe is posted somewhere in a post by me regarding sausage...maybe in the meat section.
Quote from: Kamanodental on April 17, 2007, 01:46:42 PM
I know that a cure could be made of salt, sugar and garlic. Question? Do you just mix this mixture with the meat, remove the meat from your cure and add your spices after?
The type of sausage you are making will greatly define the types of cure you would use to mix in with your meats.
I have been doing a bit of reading on it from a book recommended here called Charcuterie by Ruhlman and Polcyn. There are a lot of techniques that I have seen described on the forum here as well as in the book that greatly effect the quality of the texture of the final product. There are some recipes on Old's site and also several posts here. I have included some but you can do a search on "sausage" and get a more complete list.
http://forum.bradleysmoker.com/index.php?topic=4775.0 (http://forum.bradleysmoker.com/index.php?topic=4775.0)
http://forum.bradleysmoker.com/index.php?topic=4801.0 (http://forum.bradleysmoker.com/index.php?topic=4801.0)
http://forum.bradleysmoker.com/index.php?topic=4434.0 (http://forum.bradleysmoker.com/index.php?topic=4434.0)
If you are going to make salami, it's best to use insta cure #2 or DQ curing salt #2. This is a mixture of nitrites and nitrates. The nitrates is important in making salami and other dry sausages. The nitrates slowly break down into nitrites over time. The cure is mixed in with the meat when you add the other seasoning.
If you are talking about dry curing in the sense that you will be air drying the sausage. I just had one miserable failure in making Bresaola (dried beef) and Coppa. Coppa is like salami but with bigger chunks of meat. I tried to convert a beverage refrigerator to dry the sausage and beef. With the refrigerator on at the lowest setting the temperature would not get any higher then 50°F, and the humidity stayed below 50%; but at least there was airflow. With it off the temperatures were around 60°F-75°F with a humidity of around 70%, but there was no air flow. I then rigged up a time to cycle the refrigerator on for 1.5 hours off for 2.5 hours; but both the temps and humidity were all over the place. Eventually mold began to develop. First it was white powdery mold, which is harmless, and should have prevented other molds for developing. I was keeping the mold in check by washing the meat with a brine, or a vinegar solution. But other molds did develop so in a few days (which will be 5 weeks), I will make be taking the bresaola out and I will slice into it to see what it looks like.
I am going to build a box to air dry meat (dry cure), and install a fan that will circulate the air. A pan of salted water should provide the box with enough humidity, and the ambient room temperature should be about the right temperature to dry cure. If you have any tips, I would appreciate them.
Good luck I hope you are successful.
P.S.
I was in the middle of writing my replace when Gizmo posted. The book he mentions is a good book. That is the book I'm using as a guideline to dry curing.
Hab here is a link for fridge control, I use one to control small fridge for cheese aging http://www.midwestsupplies.com/products/ProdByID.aspx?ProdID=4230 (http://www.midwestsupplies.com/products/ProdByID.aspx?ProdID=4230) with a bowl of water in I get about 98% humidity at 55 degrees , not quite sure what temp/humidity you are looking for though
Quote from: carnie1 on April 17, 2007, 09:03:20 PM
Hab here is a link for fridge control, I use one to control small fridge for cheese aging http://www.midwestsupplies.com/products/ProdByID.aspx?ProdID=4230 (http://www.midwestsupplies.com/products/ProdByID.aspx?ProdID=4230) with a bowl of water in I get about 98% humidity at 55 degrees , not quite sure what temp/humidity you are looking for though
Thanks for the link. At first glance it may solve my problem. I've never heard of this device before.. Originally I was going to hook up a regular rheostat, but wasn't sure if it would ruin the motor, that is why I went with a timer. At least with a rheostat there will be regular airflow.
The temperatures I am looking for are 60°F-70°F (ideally 60%); with an average humidity between 60%-70%. On the temperatures, some sources quote temperatures as high as 90°.
I took a more thorough look at the refrigerator control. I was mistaken it for a rheostat, but it's an on/off control, but it may regulate my temperature better then what my current off/on timer is doing. It just may save me the work of building a dry curing box.
Here is a screen capture of the swings in temps and humidity over the past 24 hours. For some reason the last 24 hours have not been as extreme as previous readings. Temperature readings are on the left, and the humidity is on the right. Temps were fluctuating from 53°-64°F (worse case was as high as 84°F), and the humidity been fluctuating between 50%-84%.
(http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y174/Formatted/Temps/temp-humidity2.jpg)
Whoa, I feel oscillations coming on. The Stargate in my smoke generator seems to be opening....
Rod Serling
my flux capacitor is fluxing ;D
nepas
Yeah! It look like someone was trying to draw a straight line after consuming adult beverages. :)
I couldn't get the temps and humidity to be constant. By looking at the graphs it is easy to see what time the refrigerator was turned on and off.
great tips and links. thanks to all. Just made my research a lot easier.
Get the book Charcuterie mentioned above. It's the best resource I've come across for beginners to learn about all things dry-cured.
Habs, I give you credit for going after coppa right off the bat, that's one of the toughest to get right from what I understand. I wanted to do some big salamis (Dad's favorite) for my first attempt but I went with salami in the smaller hog casings as recommended for beginners in the book.
http://forum.bradleysmoker.com/index.php?topic=5469.0 (http://forum.bradleysmoker.com/index.php?topic=5469.0)
The Bradleys are great for jump starting the fermenting process when the recipes call for hanging the product at 85 degrees F, etc for several hours. (I have a digital temperature switch installed for more accuracy)
It's day 10. Recipe says 12-18 days for hog casings. Started to notice small spots of white mold appearing on the salami (perfectly fine and just as the book said it would).
I'm using a Haier wine fridge/cooler http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.do?product_id=5383879 (http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.do?product_id=5383879) Digital temp can be set between 40-65 degrees F. With a pan of salt covered with water, I've had the temp holding around 60 degrees with a humidity of 65% for the last 10 days with no problems. This set up seems to be working great. I will begin to check the salami in a few days and report back.
Keep the info coming on this. I've been soaking up everything I've been able to find on the subject.
-Brian
I wasn't able to ward off the dreaded "case hardening" and the few attempts I have done in my converted wine cooler have been sub-par. Getting killed by the lack of circulation I suspect. I've been searching like crazy for info on building a dry curing room/box and have turned up very little. I continued my research of wine storage because the storage conditions are nearly identical to dry curing meat.
I've been planning on finishing my basement into a game room and now I want to add a small dry curing room. I have found these: http://www.beveragefactory.com/wine/cooling/breezaire/wkseries/WK1060.shtml (http://www.beveragefactory.com/wine/cooling/breezaire/wkseries/WK1060.shtml) They are a little pricey but the specs say they regulate the temps and humidity in the ranges we need to dry cure. They also circulate the air. I'm going to call and ask some more questions about the humudity levels. 50-75% is a big window. If it was 60-75% I'd be a little happier. We'll see...
-Brian
Here's a great web site on how to build a wine cellar/dry curing room: http://www.bracksco.com/buildwr/index.html (http://www.bracksco.com/buildwr/index.html)
-Brian
First, the book Charcuterie is great for the topic. It's probably my most used book.
Stickbowcrafter,
I've got a similar wine fridge that I use to cure meat in. My first few attempts didn't work so well and I got mold too. Then I decided to ditch the pan of water and voila. No mold whatsoever. We've also used a different fridge to make 25 lbs of pancetta and numerous other dry cured sausages without a water pan and they've turned out great too. I've done a cold smoked dry-cured garlic sausage that was smoked with oak that turned out absolutely awesome.
I've currently got a bresaola curing, will be making 10 lbs more of chorizo sometime this week.
There's a thread on egullet about the book (don't click unless you want to read through 88 pages about dry cured meat):
http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=79195 (http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=79195)
Hey Brian
I've never tried dry sausage but here are a couple of links with regards to building a setup for it.
http://lpoli.50webs.com/Tips.htm#Humidity%20Control (click on the Humidity control link, although the whole page has good info)
http://lpoli.50webs.com/text_files/Creating%20An%20Ideal%20Environment%20For%20Dry%20Curing%20Sausage.doc
Mike
Thanks for the info Thomas. I have made over a dozen of the recipes in Charcuterie and all of them, except a few dry cure attempts, have turned out spectacular. I love that book.
I'll have to try it without the water pan and see what the humidy levels are. Do you have any circulation in your set-up? That seemed to be a problem for me as well.
Thanks Walleye. I have read those web pages as well. That is one of the better sources of info in the limited number available on the web.
-Brian
Hi Thomas;
Welcome to the forum.
Without the water pan you don't have any problems with the outer part of the meat or sausage drying too fast. If not maybe I will attempt it again in my beverage cooler.
Quote from: Habanero Smoker on October 23, 2007, 02:28:11 PM
Hi Thomas;
Welcome to the forum.
Without the water pan you don't have any problems with the outer part of the meat or sausage drying too fast. If not maybe I will attempt it again in my beverage cooler.
I didn't have any problems with the outside drying too fast in the 1 1/2" casing. With a 2 1/2" casing we took it down after 3 weeks and it was just a little difference in the inside of the sausage so we hung it for another 2 weeks.
There is no circulation inside the fridge and even with the humidity level lower than recommended that is when we've had the most success. With a water pan we've always seemed to have some mold (it's possible to wipe it down if the mold has not gotten on the inside of the casing). I left the 1 1/2" sausage I smoked (I think the smoke helped in keeping the mold away - but required more work as far as processing) for a full month while I was in China and only had my wife check on it once to verify that there was no mold on it while gone. I made that sausage like the Hungarian salami in the book. This is my notes:
Started Aug 27 2007
1 tbsp whole white pepper (crushed)
1 tbsp chpped garlic
1 lb pork back fat
4 lbs pork butt cubed
2.5 oz kosher salt
20 grams dextrose
1 cup non-fat dry milk powder
1/4 tsp f-rm-52 in a small cup of water
made like in ruhlman book for hungarian sausage
cold smoked with oak for 3 hours and 20 minutes
Cured at 58F
I took the first ones out around October 3rd and the rest out Oct 10.
That's great Thomas. Please post some pics of your set up and your products when you get a chance. I'll be doing more experimentation.
-Brian
(http://photos.eibner.dk/2007/08-30/.cache/640x480-IMG_1739.jpg)
This is right after going into the smoker to be cold smoked @ 65F.
(http://photos.eibner.dk/2007/08-30/.cache/640x480-IMG_1740.jpg)
This is after 3 hours and 20 minutes with oak. I'll take some pictures of how the sausage looks today.
I'll be starting two 5lb batches of chorizo tonight, one will be from the book with chipotle subbed for ancho, and a little aleppo pepper for some extra kick. The second one will be the same recipe with the procedure from the hungarian salami and smoked with oak. I think I'll try 5 hours like you did Brian.
Here is a picture of lamb "proscuitto" we made from a recipe posted on the egullet site. It's very good, but too "lamby" for me. Next to it is our sopresseta.
(http://photos.eibner.dk/2007/08-20/.cache/640x480-lamb_1.jpg)
Have you tried the cured salmon from the book? It's great, I've tried smoking it and making it with some scotch too.
(http://photos.eibner.dk/2007/08-11/.cache/640x480-IMG_1673.jpg)
Your after my own heart!!! That is wondeful looking and I bet just as tasty. Wish I had some extra time to get the smokers fired back up. The only thing I see missing is SNOW in the background. Geez I hate shoveling this stuff anymore. >:( ;D
Thanks soooooo... much for posting the pictures for us. Ya done yer self proud buddy. ;)
Great pic's................Make mine a double ;D
Coyote
I made the 10 lbs of chorizo the other day. I didn't really get a picture of the 'after' in the smoker since the red color from all the paprika made it not that big of a difference.
(http://photos.eibner.dk/2007/10-28/.cache/640x480-IMG_2802.jpg)
This is in the smoker getting ready to smoke.
(http://photos.eibner.dk/2007/10-28/.cache/640x480-IMG_2831.jpg)
This is a pic of an 'eye of round' that I made into a bresaola following the recipe from 'Charcuterie' with a little extra kick.
I put a 3 lb piece of pork loin in a cure to make it into dry cured lomo too. And for the hot smoking I prepared a 3 lb piece of pork loin that is sitting in a cure to make canadian bacon out of. Mmmmm MEAT!
Looks good ThomasMN I bet it all taste as good as it looks and sounds also.
Just wondering, whats the towel stuffed into the tower where the smoke generator supposed to be? Is this a new trick that I know nothing about or is it just due to your smoker not being all set up yet?
Duster,
I used the towel in the hole to make sure that nothing got in there while my sausages were sitting at 80F to inoculate the bacteria. I just didn't want a stray fly or any bugs in there.
Thomas,
Boy I got a lot to learn before I start sausage making ::)
Beautiful. I have some big plans for a new set up as my winter project. Keep us posted on your progress and I'll do the same.
-Brian
Hi, Kamanodental.
Start quote:
"I need some help with some dry curing sausage. Has any one on the forum dry cured sausage or salami? (Dry curing is new to me)"
End quote:
You cannot 'dry cure' sausages. Curing sausage is done by the 'direct curing' method. You're probably thinking about how to make dry sausages or salamis.
1. Curing
You cure your sausages to 150 ppm of Sodium Nitrate and 5000 ppm of fermenter (10,000 ppm for genoa salami). Dried sausages must have ph between 4.6 and 5.3. If you're new to making dried sausages or salamis, you may want to use GDL (glucono-delta lactone) instead of fermenter. GDL does same thing as fermenter, but fermentation is done instantaneously. GDL is the stuff you get smoothies from - it's completely natural and you could eat it as is (it is not harmful in any way). And is cheaper than fermenter – it goes for about $11 per kilogram. Dried sausages and salamis have a high percentage of salt, usually 3-3.3%.
2. Stuffing
Stuff into 2.5 inch 'protein laced artificial casings' (salamis) and 32-35 caliber hog casings. Later, when you're more experienced you could use hog bungs and beef middles
3. Smoking
As a rule of thumb, Italian salamis are not smoked. For salamis and sausages that are smoked, it's important to cold smoke (as cold as you could produce). Smoke is the powerful antioxidant - as longer you smoke, drying process will be shorter and you could afford higher drying temperature. Try not to smoke less than 3 days. If you could smoke it for 7 days, do it. Some salamis and dried sausages are smoked up to 60 days. Remember, the longer you smoke, the drying conditions afterwards are less and less important.
4. Drying
Circulation of the air
Most important thing: It's not the temperature. It's not RH. It's the circulation of the air. If you could find a place where circulation of the air is happening naturally, dry your sausages there. If not, provide some air circulation via a very small fan (you don't want to provide the wind, you want to provide just a minimal but persistent circulation of the air.
Temperature
Ideal drying temperature is between 10C and 15C ( 50F – 60F). If your sausages and salamis are properly cured and smoked for a long time, the drying temperature could go up to 20C (68F). The lowest drying temperature would be 3C (37F) but try not to dry on temperatures lower than 7C (45F).
Relative humidity
Salamis, depending of formulation asks for RH between 55-70%. Sausages (caliber of casings up to 42) ask for RH between 65-75%. If the RH goes over 80%, you have to lessen the RH via some kind of dehumidifier or to provide a stronger air circulation.
Time
Drying time depends of the size of the casings and the conditions. As a rule, sausages are finished when they lose 30-40% of their green weight, or 40% for salamis. For sausages up to 35 caliber it will take between 16 and 21 day. For salamis (2.5 inch casings) it's anywhere from 30-60 days. For salamis (bungs and middles) from 90-180 days. Remember, the longer you smoke, the less drying time will be needed.
5. Conclusion
Properly cured sausages and salamis (150 ppm of Sodium Nitrate, ph less than 5.3 and ideally about or less than 4.9 and at least 3% of salt) are insurance that (opposite of popular opinion) dried sausages and salamis are one of the safest processing meats on the market.
Hope this will help. Good luck.
PS
As someone suggested before, I would agree of using a compound called Prague powder #2 as a source of both Sodium Nitrite and Sodium Nitrate. Advantage is that you calculate ppm just for Sodium Nitrite - Sodium Nitrate amounts are automatic.