Charcuterie Must haves.

[Wampus]

^^^now that's beauty up there^^^ :clap2:

Hells yeah! I sure wish I could hang out with Thirdeye some and pick his brain.......AND his bacon!:becky::thumb:

 

[Capozzoli]

Oh man that bacon looks awesome!

MMMM cured and cold smoked meats.


Slanina (Slovakian style bacon)

These are all feral hog from down South.

Cured and cold smoked venison.

Cured and cold smoked domestic pork.

Anybody ever make blood sausage? I love the Spanish Morcillia, I want to learn how to make that. but not so much the eastern European variety.

I am thinking about getting a small pig and breaking it down myself, never tried it.

 

[Mikey063]

I just took my pork bellies out of the brine, and now inside of vacuum bags. That is after I did a coating of maple and curing blend, which I got out of my brand new Charcuterie book I got today :-D Now I let it rest until firm.

 

[Mikey063]

Oh and I am looking at trying blood sausage when I get the hang of basic sausage lol

 

[boatnut]

I think it is. I have the next size up and really love it. the 2 speed gears makes re-loading really easy.

Ok I was looking at sausage stuffers and came across this one. http://www.cabelas.com/product/Weston-Products-Stuffer/940413.uts?Ntk=AllProducts&searchPath=%2Fcatalog%2Fsearch.cmd%3Fform_state%3DsearchForm%26N%3D0%26fsch%3Dtrue%26Ntk%3DAllProducts%26Ntt%3Dsausage%2Bstuffer%26x%3D0%26y%3D0%26WTz_l%3DHeader%253BSearch-All%2BProducts&Ntt=sausage+stuffer&WTz_l=Header%3BSearch-All+Products

Is it worth the price?

 

[SmokeOCD]

Hey Cap what the heck did you top the slanina with? I usually just chomp on it straight like you would with cheese cubes. Fresh bread and some green onions or garlic; wash it down with some slivo or something along those lines...

 

[Capozzoli]

We top Slanina with green onions, white onions, horchitca and chren,

In the picture is diced white onion, horseradish and Slovakian mustard. The best mustard in the world BTW. :-D

 

[SmokeOCD]

OK that sounds good - I was horrified that you might have topped it with some kind of cabbage concoction. uke:

 

[Mikey063]

Good thing. I just bought the sausage stuffer for 99 dollars plus 5 shipping.

 

[thirdeye]

Oh man that bacon looks awesome!

MMMM cured and cold smoked meats.


Slanina (Slovakian style bacon)

Now that is some serious color. It looks delicious. Now, what is the curing method and the seasonings?

 

[Capozzoli]

Cabbage, yikes. Sounds like something my mother in law would do though, maybe some corn on there too.

The curing method is wet cure. Morton's tender quick with about one part sugar to 4 parts tender quick. The Slanina is cured for about three days I think. Then it went into a cleann water soak over night to pull some of the slats back out. Then I put it in front of a fan for about three hours to dry and form a pecicile (im sorry I cant remember that word for the film). Then into a cold smoker at 50 degrees light wisps of alderwood smoke for about six hours.

The game is cured in Morton's tenderquick, sugar, garlic, black pepper.
Wet cure also, cold smoked the same way but for about 20 hours. Same for the venison.

The sausage is ground feral hog with garlic, paprika, marjoram, caroway seeds, mortons tenderquick.

I think I got it all.

I think the most common mistake people amke with cold smoking other then letting the stuff get to hot is too much smoke. Light almost invisible wisps of smoke, is the key.

 

[Mikey063]

Cabbage, yikes. Sounds like something my mother in law would do though, maybe some corn on there too.

The curing method is wet cure. Morton's tender quick with about one part sugar to 4 parts tender quick. The Slanina is cured for about three days I think. Then it went into a cleann water soak over night to pull some of the slats back out. Then I put it in front of a fan for about three hours to dry and form a pecicile (im sorry I cant remember that word for the film). Then into a cold smoker at 50 degrees light wisps of alderwood smoke for about six hours.

The game is cured in Morton's tenderquick, sugar, garlic, black pepper.
Wet cure also, cold smoked the same way but for about 20 hours. Same for the venison.

The sausage is ground feral hog with garlic, paprika, marjoram, caroway seeds, mortons tenderquick.

I think I got it all.

I think the most common mistake people amke with cold smoking other then letting the stuff get to hot is too much smoke. Light almost invisible wisps of smoke, is the key.

How long do you wet cure it? I am currently doing a wet and dry cure on some pork belly.

 

[gbguy71]

I too, bought the book. After reading it and further investigetion, I found that there are no retail dry curing chambers. The closest you get is a wine fridge. The problem is keeping the humidity, and the temperature exact. I saw some converted fridges, with humidifiers, and lightbulbs installed on the inside. These do the job of balancing the temp and humidity. Also , I've heard of using salt, in the bottom of the fridge. Most people didn't seem to have alot of luck this way tho.

It'll be great to see what results people on here have had, or get. I did some bacon, and it turned out spectacular! Plan on doing some canadian bacon, or proscuitto next!

Check out this guy's site for a GREAT way to build a drying chamber/. It is more complicated/scientific than Ruhlman's book indicates. His site is a wonderful resource - good recipes and a good writer.

I've got some issues with Ruhlman's sausage making. Kutas is better. Another good book is Home Production of Quality Meats and Sausages by the Marianski's (whose web site has been mentioned earlier - a WONDERFUL resource). Having said that Ruhlman's book is an absolute winner. I've made bresaola, duck prosciutto, duck confit, terrines, onion confit, tomato confit, and others. EVERYTHING has been wonderful!

My plan is to build a great hot smoker and then a high-tech drying chamber. I've got a cellar now that I can use, but the super high humidity needed to prevent case hardening is beyond my capabilities.

 

[wildflower]

I practice the art and I dont have any equipment other then a food processor, a sausage stuffing funnel and some mortons tender quick.

Oh yeah and I use an old electric fan too.

so you hand stuff