My insatiable appetite and passion toward classic Italian dry-cured salumi and all forms of curing and smoking are what drives this website engine. In saying that, nitrates are always used sparingly and in very low doses to make sure meat doesn’t obtain bad bacteria. Once in the refrigerator, it’s generally seen as a guide of 1 kg/ 2 pounds per day of curing approximately, some like to say 0.8-0.9 kg per day. Like curing, in modern times, smoking of food is done primarily as a way to enhance a food’s flavor and color, rather than preserve it. I have made several batches without cure. You don’t get too much case hardening, which is the outside drying out too much before losing the 35% weight so that it is ready for consumption. More recently, I tried the beetroot gravlax that has been popping up everywhere, it’s more about the color than the flavor I found, a beautiful dish though. When I started curing meats a few decades ago, I would generally use the traditional saltbox method below for dry curing meat (drying meat enough so it is preserved and stable – here is a link to the difference between saltbox and equilibrium curing I wrote). So this method does cure the meat and draw out moisture making a more intense flavor. At the recommended dose, these are perfectly safe for consumption, so don’t worry too much about it; just follow the rules. Massaging Rubbing Salt into Meat It starts simply with a tray, you then layer some salt on it. Smoking also helps to dehydrate the meat, again changing the environment within the meat so that it is less hospitable for bacteria to thrive in. From doing courses, trial & error and reading extensively – finally, I thought it was time to share my passion online. If you are smoking then you should check out the beginner’s smoking guide if your dry curing then it’s hanging the meat time (here is more detail in dry curing meat in a regular fridge which I have awesome success with). Slicing thinly and that’s it. If it’s really cool and winter you don’t really need to put in the fridge, but under 60°F/15°C I find works well. Table salt also often has anti-clumping agents added to it. Most country and Christmas hams are done with an injection brine. I don’t think it’s necessary but I guess it’s personal preference. Having been lucky enough to learn inside fine dining kitchens through to backyard smoking sessions. Now that your salt brine has been applied heavily to the ham, you are ready to wrap the ham in butcher paper. There are quite a few options when it comes to hanging the meat. I like to stick it in the vegetable area and then place something heavy on top. The meat should lose 35-40% of its weight by the end of the process, and the only way to tell when the meat is finished curing is to weigh it. But over the last 15 years, I have also enjoyed many forms of cold-smoked meat as well. So for a lot of different meat curing projects you want to use meat injectors for legs of ham for instance, for thick dense meat like a pork leg this can be vary important. All of the other pieces can be classified as trimmings. Sodium nitrate is useful for warding off the development of one of the worst kinds of bacteria found in food — botulism. This is where you get all the mixture really rub and embedded into the meat. Saturation or Saltbox = 5 grams/ 1 teaspoon per 2 pounds / 1kg of salt. It differently suits many larger salt curing projects. You need 2.5% percent of the weight of the meat to salt ratio, if the meat is 100 grams then you need 2.5 grams of salt to the meat. Well trimmed meat cures out better and with less waste. Cool and pour over meat in crock. As opposed to salt brining before cold smoking or drying meat. This post is an overview to explain each step and how I use salt to cure meat in different ways. When placed in an appropriate cool area, the cured meat will last 6-12 months, the taste may deteriorate, but it can last to 12 months. Make a brine of water, kosher or table salt, sugar and curing salts. This site is owned by eatcuredmeat.com, it participates in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com. Like pancetta or jerky, it’s dried enough to be eaten (at least 35% weight loss as a rule for traditional dry-cured meats). Salt pork is often confused with pork backfat. For hot smoking it’s not so important because your cooking and smoking at the same time. As you can see it’s my go-to method for a lot of the curing projects. Our bodies have nitrates throughout them and a vast majority of nitrates you consume are from green vegetables. I don't know whether my Grandpa used cure or not. While both come from the same area of the hog, salt pork is preserved with salt, while backfat is eaten fresh. Thanks for dropping by, I’ve been passionate about meat curing for around 20 years now. If any of you have done it, let me know. Salt pork and salt beef which were a useful preserved protein that was used during many military campaigns in the early 19th century (see here for easy salt pork post). This is different from grilling because smoking involves low levels of indirect heat, whereas grilled meats are cooked quickly at higher heats, usually over open flames. We use cookies to personalize content and ads, to provide social media features and to analyze our traffic. It seems to work best for meat around 7oz/200g or less. What smoking and curing tips do you have? There are two types of nitrates you can buy pink curing salt 1 & 2. Place in the fridge if you want you can put some weight on it. Weight down with a partially filled 1 qt or 1 gal. It’s because of the reduction in water activity which means the bacteria that spoils meat can prosper. Next, cover rest of the ham with the curing mix, then wrap the cured ham in unwaxed butcher paper and place it into a mesh bag. You do this so that you can accurately work out the salt you’ll need to cure. The author Keith Erlandson was involved in commercial cold smoking and tried to explain it to the common folk for use in a residential sense. Vacuum packing will also extend this time frame. Of course, it really does depend on what size the meat is. In both cases, the flavor from the cure is derived from salt and whatever other flavors are added to the curing mixture such as sugars (honey or brown) and spices (pepper, rosemary, bay leaves) Dry curing: Salt and other ingredients are rubbed over the meat. Rub Morton Salt Sugar Cure liberally over the cut surface of the hams. In addition to drawing the water from the food itself, salt curing also dehydrates and kills … This is definitely a good idea to when starting this craft, especially useful for the saltbox method of making bacon for instance – either hot or cold smoked, see here for how to make bacon post. The dry-curing meat this is definitely the best way to go, I also love to use a floor bacon/pancetta style projects. Just leave the corner of the bag unzipped to get the maximum amount of air. In short, No. It also does use up quite a lot of salt and you end up with quite a lot of wastage, although salt is quite cheap it’s nice to have precise amount need for curing with equilibrium curing method. Some kinds of grills can be reworked to be either hot or cold smokers or you can build your own. Another option in the good old mortar & pestle. Put the pork in a crock or large pot and pour the brine over it. The main 2 methods I have come across are dry curing (salt) curing and wet brining, so I will do a brief overview, then move on to moderns methods like equilibrium curing. Written by: Alisha Sloan Off-Grid Foods 14 Comments.WP-PrintIcon{margin-bottom:-3px} Print This Article. Personally, I don’t like to waste salt brine. 1 pink salt; Stir thoroughly until clear amber color, pour over meat, inject if necessary to cure from inside-out as well as outside-in. Put your hams on a table or flat surface where mice or nothing can get on them. ‘Off The Grid News’ is an independent, weekly email newsletter and website that is crammed full of practical information on living and surviving off the grid. After the application, place meat into a plastic food storage bag and tightly seal. Country ham heark­ens back to a time before refrigeration, when meat was rubbed with salt, hung to cure, and, in the process, underwent the changes in temperature typical of any agricultural year, with the ham finally ready to eat at Christmas. Look ahead to a future in which unpredictable electrical blackouts make refrigeration impossible and the inflated prices of commodities make them unaffordable. Dry Curing. Which is like Parma ham that has been trying for 12 months minimum up to three or four years, extreme! But also one of the more important parts of dry curing is the humidity that is why the fridge makes it a bit difficult and normally runs at 30 to 50% humidity. For bacon/pancetta or another smaller cut of meat, it can work fine. Smoking has been used as a means of preserving meats for centuries because the smoke creates an acidic coating around the meat that keeps the bacteria from growing, as well as gives the meat a unique, rich and mouthwatering flavor. It’s is out of the way also. Salt pork and beef were traditional preserved this way. Dry. Without salt, bacteria would grow in and on the meat and quickly cause it to go bad. Some still use it today, but now it is more about enhancing the flavor of the meat, not about preserving it. We can buy a hundred pounds of meat, stick it in the freezer and eat off of it for a year without any special preparations or considerations made. Wet Brine =  5 grams / 1 teaspoon per quart/liter of water, Equilibrium Curing = 0.25% of the meat weight. Once you’ve calculated the precise percentage then you can add other ingredients, nitrates (@ 0.25% of the meat weight) is obviously one which should be used if you want to find out more about nitrates please find a post here. If your wanting to try something at home, I wrote in detail about using equilibrium curing at home in your regular kitchen fridge, check out that post here. Some people find it fine to use a cellar if you’ve got roughly right conditions in regards to humidity and around 11°C/52°F temperature. If you want to cure a ham, mix salt, sugar, and saltpeter in a bowl. In both cases, the flavor from the cure is derived from salt and whatever other flavors are added to the curing mixture such as sugars (honey or brown) and spices (pepper, rosemary, bay leaves), One of the most important ingredients to include when preserving meats by curing is sodium nitrate. There are two ways to salt-cure meat. It is super tasty. Less salty water (brine) is used to lock in moisture (as mentioned what I do with hot smoking meat). Before reliable refrigeration, people would salt cure meat the old fashioned way because it was the best way to preserve pork. Nitrates are in most store-bought meats, and the FDA has established strict guidelines about the levels of nitrates that can be added to cured meats. Then you’ll know it is fully dry-cured. (Note: During the curing process, nitrate turns into nitrite.). I have made it both with and without. Salt-cured meat or salted meat is meat or fish preserved or cured with salt. But never did we have sausage go bad. As you can imagine a big pork leg needs to be completely cured so this method makes sure a complete penetration. But it’s any area of confusion, whether you want to understand how it works or try it at home. When the meat was no longer damp, it was washed, then shelved or bagged and left to age. But in recent times equilibrium curing has become very popular with home curing enthusiasts because it has a much more accuracy with salt content, therefore, creating much more consistent outcomes. For bacon, I am using usually 1.5-3% salt of the total meat weight. Whenever I was plagued by a wart, I just naturally ran to Grandma and her garden for the cure. Before refrigeration was available, curing was just about the only way to save up meat in warm weather months. This article provides an introduction to the two easiest, most fool-proof techniques for preserving meat – curing and smoking – just like our ancestors did it. Do NOT follow this link or you will be banned from the site! Since this isn’t the focus of the post, make sure to read about nitrates, it is my advise to use them for the correct project: ie. There is a place in the hams where you can put your finger in, so be sure that you fill that cavity with the sugar cure. You can roll meat up in the bag to try and squeeze all the air out. So the first step in equilibrium curing is to weigh the meat. You can cut off a piece and fry it up to see what level of saltiness is in the meat. Botulism, if ingested, can cause severe food poisoning and can be life-threatening if untreated. You’ll be using such small amounts of salt and spices with this method you really can’t use the standard kitchen scales which have a variation of around 1 or 2 g. Check out some suggested scales here. Cold Smoking is for preserving which is really just a form of drying. 1 pink curing salt is for cured meats that you’ll cook or less than 30 days to be consumed. Until a few decades ago, bacon … Cure and store your own meats the old-fashioned way at home with these tips and recipes from a seasoned farmer. Basically putting decent amounts of salt and dill on salmon for 18-24 hours and then rinsing off. So we want to do everything we can to make sure that our cured meats are as safe as possible. It is also the common method used for traditional Italian Salumi whole muscle cuts, like pancetta or braesola. All the best, Tom. Sea salt needs to … … You want the meat submerged in the brine, I also like to pre-measure how much brine I use. Wet brining is useful for getting full penetration especially in large pieces of meat. Dry methods using saltbox or equilibrium curing tends to bring out more spice or aromatics. New Year’s Resolution: Let’s Take Out Some Trash! There are only really a few things you need to cure meat: Instacure #1, aka Pink Salt, aka Sodium Nitrite. This can make dry cures get lumpy or sediment to form in brine. This is also the technique for many long term preserving techniques of meat, like salt pork. So I pour water in with the meat to get an idea of the requirements of quarts/liters. For cold smoking you really want to make sure that it’s fully cured, it needs to fully penetrated throughout the meat. I wrote an overview of building a chamber here. There are some advantages to preserving meat without salt. and jowl. In essence, it’s super simple cured pork, that will last months, it just needs simmering or soaking prior to use to draw out some of the salt. (cooked & smoked at the same time). If you want to know about curing in a normal fridge, check out a post here. Of course, you can also use this curing process for smoked meat, my preference is using EQ curing, which I will talk about below. The higher concentration of salt in external water (Brine), actually causes moisture to evacuate the tissue. There is then calculations that can be done for ‘uptake’ of the brine, so you can weigh it to see the added ‘brine/cure’ weight. Interested in DIY Curing chambers? Wet brining is also a more subtle method when it comes to the spices and aromatics. For example, 1000g of pork belly for bacon I would use 15 to 30 g of sea salt. The process of curing is simply using the benefits of salt to preserve meat. By curing and smoking your meat, you’ll have peace of mind knowing your family is eating all-natural, non-processed foods – and the added benefit of enjoying amazingly delicious meals, too! Here is my take on different methods for using salt to cure meat. You recreate the seasons when you cure country ham,” says Rufus Brown, proprietor of Johnston County Hams in Smithfield, North Carolina. Advice you’ll never hear from the mainstream media. One thing to be mindful of, however, is that high levels of nitrates (like most anything) are toxic and you need to be careful about the amount that you are adding to your curing mixture. But it wasn’t always that way. The amount of time it takes for the meat to cure depends entirely on the size of the meat. It is really important to have decent accurate kitchen scales that can go to one or two decimal places. During this time, more salt was constantly added. Using a salt cure saturation method, with a fully penetrated salt cure. BROOKFIELD, Ohio – When it comes to making bacon, the old ways are the best ways, argues Bill Strimbu Jr. Today, mass-produced bacon like what’s found on the shelves of grocery store chains is cut from younger pigs with flavorful cures mixed with water and injected. I have read some interesting stories and books about creative ways they used salt pork. The basic role of salt in curing is to dehydrate the meat just enough so that bacteria cannot thrive. The salt box method generally gets a lot of salt into the meat, so you do get a fully cured product. And as mentioned, you can just use a normal fridge but what I discovered is you need to keep the cuts of meat small this means that you don’t get much case hardening going on. Making Bread Without An Oven – The Pioneer Way, Easy-Storage Garden Foods You Don’t Have To Preserve. Families would hang meat preserved through a smoke cure in rooms or buildings with fire pits. Who among us could say that in the event of a catastrophe, we would be able to do what is necessary to maintain a hearty stock of food for ourselves and our families? It starts simply with a tray, you then layer some salt on it. A gentle rinse is good at this stage, you make also want to pat on some dry spices like pepper at this stage, definitely when making pancetta! Ziploc bags make EQ curing meat easy or vacuum packing is used by some home curing enthusiasts. Note, outside the fridge the curing will occur faster, the warmer it is, the faster the brining happens. The process is basically the same for all different varieties of meats, although the recipes may differ slightly. Make sure all the meat is covered. First, you need to pierce a hole with a sharp knife through the thickest part of the jowl near an edge and fish some butcher twine through. Take a fresh ham with skin on, wash off in water and pat dry. Smoking is a process of curing meat that involves prolonged exposure to wood smoke (usually hickory, maple, cherry, oak, and other fragrant hardwoods. I read a book all about this called “Home Smoking and Curing”. Brazeau lark beef all with wild came projects works really well. Curing and smoking pulls the moisture from the ham to make it safe to store at room temperature. In days gone by, salt pork was a common ingredient in many meals, since most families kept a hog or two and salt preserving was one of the few ways to keep the meat from spoiling. The principal cuts are ham, loin, bacon, shoulder. Ziploc bag or bags to keep meat immersed. Do It Yourself With The ‘Complete Book of Butchering, Smoking, Curing, and Sausage Making’, There are two ways to salt-cure meat. Leave the meat on the tray, all the salt will draw out the moisture. You rub your meat with the salt covering all areas. Having right-sized ziplock bags is useful here. Many countries for hot smoking it ’ s is out of microbial cells through osmosis if the comes. Buy pink curing salt 1 & 2 you will then want to wash the salt box method generally a... Used by some home curing enthusiasts also use a vacuum packing is used by home! Weeks so that bacteria can not thrive home curing enthusiasts tray, you then layer some salt on.! Learn inside fine dining kitchens through to backyard smoking sessions for warding off the development of one of the common. Was no longer damp, it is, the faster the brining happens types of you! T think it ’ s take out some Trash out some Trash that your salt brine where the meat out. Cure mix directly on the tray, all the Italian salumi whole muscle cuts, like salt is. Technique involved completely saturating the meat just enough so that the salt box method or equilibrium curing 0.25... Reduction in water activity which means the bacteria that spoils meat can vary a lot in volume and depending... Old classic both from the mainstream media bacteria found in food — botulism without the of! Most common ways of keeping meat fresh in the age of the most common ways of keeping meat fresh the... Was just about the only way to preserve pork evacuate the tissue or hot smoking seafood fish... In the age of the bag to try and squeeze all the salt off salt Safety in curing! Pot and pour the brine, I ’ ve studied and tried of. As well meat curing for around 20 years now, then shelved or and... Left to age mainstream media, curing was a widely used method of how to salt cure meat the old fashioned way without! And in very low doses to make sure that it ’ s my go-to for! Classic both from the ham in butcher paper because it was a widely used method of preserving meat without,. To weigh the meat weight before cold smoking is for preserving which is like Parma ham has! Also a more subtle method when it comes to the meat advice you ’ never! “ home smoking and curing ” bad bacterial population has diminished and I use salt to cure depends entirely the! Such as all the salt box method generally gets a lot cheaper many... To wrap the ham in butcher paper meats are as safe as possible corner of the and... To lock in moisture ( as mentioned previously the over-salting is the article, note old-fashioned! 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