Curing

[Jonty]

After otherwayup's posts on his pigs legs I thought I might start a thread on curing as there seems to be a few people interested and I'd like to maybe show that it's not so much of a dark art and that at some level, any one of us could have a go and have some really good results.

 

I'm no expert by a long shot but if I can help anyone out I'd be more than happy to. It also seem there are a few guys on here who know their stuff so hopefully there could be some really good information going into this.

 

The easiest and safest way to get into curing is to buy a ready made cure - one where someone has done the footwork for you, that way you can apply the cures safe in the knowledge that you're not going to poison anyone. There are chemicals that are used in curing such as sodium nitrite and sodium nitrate which are useful as they produce an environment in meat that makes it difficult for bugs to breed, they need to be treated with respect - but they're nothing to be scared of as long as they are used in the right quantities - it usually says on the pack what ratio of cure to meat to use. That said, to start with, whlst getting used to the ropes/procedures a pre-mixed cure might be the easiest option.

 

There are two separate curing techniques - curing meats that will then be cooked such as bacon/gammon etc, and curing meats that will be eaten 'raw' such as air dried ham, salami etc.

 

Some good suppliers to get people started are:

 

http://www.weschenfelder.co.uk/home

 

http://www.sausagemaking.org/

 

You'll find most things you'd need on either of the two

[Jonty]

The easiest way to start curing is by making some bacon - it's very easy to do and usually produces great results. All you need is some meat, a fridge, some cure and a plastic bag, so that's probably the best thing to start with.

 

If you wanted to buy a ready made cure you could get either http://www.sausagemaking.org/acatalog/Traditional_dry_cure_bacon_.html or http://www.weschenfelder.co.uk/content/supracure-dry-cured-bacon I think the latter is very good.

 

You can add extras to a ready made cure such as treacle, dark sugar, garlic etc, just make sure you add it to the mix after you've weighed out the cure at the manufacurers guidelines.

 

Next, the meat, either belly pork for streaky or loin for back bacon. I like streaky so I opt for belly. If you ask your butcher for the 'thick end' of the belly you'll get more meat to fat - it's worth asking about this as most butchers use that bit themselves for bacon so if you call in a day or two before, you should be able to order some.

 

Piece of belly, skin and bones removed (make scratchings from the skin and barby ribs from the bones)

 

 

Rub the cure all over - all the nooks and crannies. Rubber gloves are useful too

 

 

Wrap in clingfilm (very tightly) or put into a ziplock bag and put into the fridge for the time reccomended by the maker of the cure (normally xx days per inch thickness of the meat) - turn it every day or so and don't drain the liquid off

 

 

After its time in the fridge, rinse it in cold water and then leave it uncovered on the fridge shelf overnight to dry out. For streaky bacone, if you don't have a slicer, rollit tightly in cling film, it's easier to slice

 

 

It;ll be the best bacon you've ever tasted

 

[hafod]

yep jonty your bang on ,

 

once people have ate there own cured bacon , they will never buy that shop bought **** again thats cut that thin you could read the paper through it .

 

a lot of older friends who have ate the bacon that i have done in the past , have all commented that its the same tasting bacon they ate in the in the 40s and 50s when they were kids ,

 

it makes its own fat in the pan when frying , little tip from my mother , strain the bacon fat out of the pan once you,ve cooked the bacon to make welsh cakes or bakestones as we call them in my neck of the woods , they taste beautifull try it .

[henry d]

cheers guys

[pob]

Super post Jonty. Well done.

 

You make it sound so easy, and it really is. I agree that everyone should try it.

 

I use a cheap vacuum sealer to package whilst curing, which makes things even easier especially saving space in the fridge.

 

...and I would encourage anyone to then try cold smoking their own bacon; it is very rewarding.

[Jonty]

I'm with you on the cold smoking pob, again something that is so simple to do.

 

If anyone fancies a go at cold smoking, there's a bit of kit on the market caled a Pro Q cold smoke generator which is in my opinion, one of the best pieces of kit to come out of the smoking/barbeque industry for years. It's so simple its genius... and it means that anyone can have a go at home without having to build a complicated smoker.

 

I'm not involved with the product in any way, I just think it's a brilliant piece of kit, it's simpl a mesh basket

 

 

Fill it with sawdust

 

 

Get it smouldering with a tea light candle and then take the candle away and it smoulders with no flame or heat for a good 9 hours. I used my existing kettle type barbeque to smoke some cheese. As there's no flame or heat you could use anything, even a cardboard box

 

 

I ended up converting a food grade oil drum into a decent sized cold smoker as I use it a fair bit but you could use virtually any container - just give it a little ventilation so that the smoke can get out of the container or it turns acrid.

 

 

 

 

 

I think the cold smoke generator cost me 25 quid and it is honestly worth every penny, it opens up smoked bacon, cheese, salmon, kippers, sausages............. the list is endless.

Edited October 8, 2012 by Jonty

[D_No]

My stomach is rumbling

[Catweazle]

Great post Jonty, very interesting. What kind of sawdust does the smoker use ?

[Jonty]

Great post Jonty, very interesting. What kind of sawdust does the smoker use ?

 

You can buy saw dust from the guy who makes/sells the smoker which is guaranteed to smoulder ok with the unit, or you can either make your own or buy from another source - you do need to make sure it's fine enough and dry. The stuff from the supplier isn't the cheapest but it probably works out at less than a .quid a fill.

 

I regularly get burn times of 12-17 hours from 1 fill although the manufacturer states 9 hours.

[Zapp]

That bacon is sooooo getting made this weekend!

[Jonty]

Once you've done the bacon, the next easiest thing to have a go at is surprisingly smoked salmon. If you've got a cold smoker happy days, if not you can buy a bottle of liquid smoke from ebay for about 3 quid and brush that on to the fish instead of smoking.

 

You can get cracking results with the £10 offer sides of salmon you get in the supermarkets.

 

Pull the pin bones from the fish

 

 

For each side of salmon, mix approx 1 mug of sea salt, half a mug of soft brown sugar, pinch of dill and whatever other herbs you fancy

 

 

Apply the mix to your side of salmon - use more cure on the thicker parts and less of the thinner tail end

 

 

Wrap tightly in cling film, and leave in the fridge for 18-24 hours - it will leak liquid so make sure its wrapped up and has a tray under it.

 

Take it out of the fridge, rinse off the salt under the cold tap and pat dry with a tea towell. The fish is now cured.

 

Leave the fish to dry out overnight - best way is un covered laid directly on the fridge shelf, by the morning the fisgh should have a glossy sheen to it - this is the 'pellicle' and will help the fish take smoke.

 

If you were using liquid smoke, paint it on then tightly wrap the fish in cling film or vac pack for 24 hours to get the flavour into the fish.

 

If smoking, bung the fish in the smoker for 12-36 hours depending on how efficient your smoker is and how smoky you like your fish, mine suits about 18 hours for my palate.

 

 

After smoking, give it the cling film/vac pack treatment for 24 hours before eating, this really lets the smoke 'soak' into the meat rather than sticking to the outside.

 

It really is incredibly simple, just fish, salt, sugar, herbs and smoke - you can easily do a side of albeit supermarket salmon for less than £12 for maybe 30 minutes of effort over 2 or three days.

Edited October 8, 2012 by Jonty

[hafod]

for those interested in making there own , salami , chorizo , and countless other recipes i would like to recomend the following book

 

HOME SAUSAGE MAKING , by susan mahnke peery & charles g reavis ISBN NO 1 - 58017 - 471 - X

published by storey books

 

as with all american books it goes into great depth on the subject ( 283 pages ), it is a very good read , i think i bought my copy from the smallholder magazine bookstore about 10 years ago

 

as there seems to be a great deal of interest on the subject of making air dried chorizo and salami it gives you the basic steps in making it safely , there,s also a lot of recipes for game , pork , beef , lamb , poultry ,fish ,shellfish ,and vegetarian sausage , that might be of interest to a lot of people , theres even a recipe for rabbit sausage in there somewhere .

 

i dont know if you have this book already jonty , thought it might interest you , i,ve tried quite a few of the sausage recipes and they were rather good , the cajun andouille sausage was my favorite , though i didnt have any pecan wood or sugarcane for smoking them though LOL .

[Zapp]

Right, I'm not going to be able to get hold of the proper rub by the weekend, so I'm looking to make my own. Can I get away without pooping about with saltpetre? Can you recommend a nice cure recipe that has a bit of sweetness?

[bi9johnny]

i have a whole loin in the fridge as we speak and it's curing in salt and mollases sugar ready to be smoked next week

it's real good

[hafod]

i,m sorry zapp i cannot be of any help , i,ve looked through my curing notebooks

 

i do have a sweet cure mixture , but it does contain saltpetre ( potassium nitrate )

[DrBlox]

 

i do have a sweet cure mixture , but it does contain saltpetre ( potassium nitrate )

 

Jane Grigson's 'English Food' says that saltpetre is added mainly to stop discolouration. You could leave it out, but the meat would be a dead grey colour - not a pink.

[AlistairB]

Mods, can this be pinned?

Edited October 9, 2012 by blackla

[Jonty]

for those interested in making there own , salami , chorizo , and countless other recipes i would like to recomend the following book

 

HOME SAUSAGE MAKING , by susan mahnke peery & charles g reavis ISBN NO 1 - 58017 - 471 - X

published by storey books

 

i dont know if you have this book already jonty , thought it might interest you , i,ve tried quite a few of the sausage recipes and they were rather good , the cajun andouille sausage was my favorite , though i didnt have any pecan wood or sugarcane for smoking them though LOL .

 

Hafod, I do have it, it's as you say - very detailes, and probably an excellant choice for anyone wanting to have a foray into sausage making. Good suggestion!

[hafod]

zapp

 

i,ve had another look through my curing notebook , and found a curing recipe that does NOT include saltpetre , its called suffolk treacle cure that can be used for bacon or ham , this sweetcure takes roughfully about a fortnight to three weeks for a flitch of bacon depending on the thickness of course , i,ve not tried this one myself though , if your interested p/m me

[PhilR]

This is a great thread Jonty. I've just ordered the cure from Weschenfelder and will be getting the belly pork next week.

[Jonty]

This is a great thread Jonty. I've just ordered the cure from Weschenfelder and will be getting the belly pork next week.

 

Good stuff - Photo's please!!

[Jonty]

Here's one for the stalkers - Bresola. I made this one with beef, but I reckon it would lend itself beautifully to a nice bit of venison. Again, very easy to do and it dries in no time at all, weeks rather than months.

 

The key ingredient in this type of curing is Cure#2 its a mix of salt, sodium nitrate and sodium nitrite. Cure#2 is used for meats that you don't cook such as salami, parma ham bresola etc ans it's very important that you don't get it mixed up with another type of preserving salt called Cure#1 which is used in meats you do cook such as bacon, gammon, ham etc.

 

You can buy Cure#2 from here http://www.sausagema...log/cure_2.html

 

The key thing with Cure#2 is use it at the ratio shown on the packet it comes in (on the one on the link it's 2.5g cure per kilo of meat) and weigh it out very carefully. It is toxic in high quantities so a bit of caution doen't go amiss.

 

I stuffed the solid joint of meat into a large salami skin (bought from the same place as the cure) because I wanted to hang it in my garage and the skin gives some protection against flies. It's not neccessary, but I thought that it would be a good one to show as if you only had a garage to hang it, it'll show you it can be done.

 

Anyway, take your piece of beef/venison, weigh it and then calculate your cure mix. The main three ingredienst would be salt (at 5% of the weight of the beef), sugar (at 1% the weight of the beef), Cure#2 (at the reccomended ratio on the pack) and then any herbs or spices you want - it's worth not going too heavy so you can taste the meat but black pepper and juniper go well.

 

Rub the mix all over the meat, and put it in a plastic bag and bung it into the fridge for a couple of weeks, give it a turn every few days - I find leaving it next to the beers helps with reminding me

 

After a couple of weeks in the cure

 

 

Give it a quick rinse in cold water to get rid of the salt etc and pat dry

 

 

If you have somewhere fly proof to hang, you can avoid this next stage and just tie it up and hang it, but if not, take your salami skin & meat......

 

 

Tie it up

 

 

Hang it until it loses 25% of its original weight, this might only be a couple of weeks or so

 

Jobs a good un'

 

 

I reckon it'd be belting if made with a nice bit of venison.

 

I know I'm posting a lot of stuff I've done on here - the intention really isn't to blow my own trumpet so to speak - I just want to show how straightforward it is and how by boxing a bit clever such as using a salami skin, anyone could knock one of these up and hang it in there garage and get some good results.

Edited October 12, 2012 by Jonty

[vulpicide]

Just about to order cure from Weschenfelder deided to try the Cumberland sausage mix and American burger mix at same time great thread and good foties Jonty hopefully I'll get photos before I eat all the Goodies

[pob]

I made Breasola from a couple of small bone-in muntjac haunches that I had. It's a joint that I find slightly difficult to do much with, when they are small other than to cut up for dice. Too small and lean to roast well, and any steaks come up small. I'm not a terribly imaginative chef though.

 

So I tried this with one http://www.thestalkingdirectory.co.uk/showthread.php/37061-Venison-Bresaola and another got the HFW recipe in 'Meat'. They both looked awful, but were very well received. If anything the HFW one went down better, due to the citrus and spice tones. I let it dry out a bit too much and it all went Pete Tong's brother Bil. It looked like that bloke in the British Museum, Pete Marsh.

 

With some of Jonty's ideas, it could have been even better. Next time I'll de-bone it, roll it and stuff it in a salami skin.

[Zapp]

I know I'm posting a lot of stuff I've done on here - the intention really isn't to blow my own trumpet so to speak - I just want to show how straightforward it is and how by boxing a bit clever such as using a salami skin, anyone could knock one of these up and hang it in there garage and get some good results.

 

Keep it coming please. This is an excellent thread.