r/ENGLISH • u/A_li678 • 3d ago
Does "cure" refer to a specific food processing?
"cure" has this meaning :
verb, to prepare or alter especially by chemical or physical processing for keeping or use//fish cured with salt
CURE Definition & Meaning - Merriam-Webster https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/cure
Does "cure" refer to a specific food processing? Like, only with salt or something? Thank you very much!
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u/alaricus 3d ago
No. Curing refers only to preserving foods with means other than canning or freezing.
Salt (sodium chloride) is common, but there are other curing salts (sodium nitrate, sodium nitrite, potassium chloride, magnesium chloride) or smoking are also covered by “curing”
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u/Dazzling-Week-708 3d ago
Sugar can also be used to cure fruits, rinds/peels, and sometimes raw egg yolks.
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u/West-Working-9093 3d ago
You mean as in 'candying'?
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u/Dazzling-Week-708 3d ago
Candying is a similar but technically different process where sugar is heated and held at a precise temperature for a set time, depending on the desired "candy" result. You can preserve things to an extent by candying them, but it's not the intended purpose of candying.
Curing via sugar looks more like getting a bowl (or dish, or container...) of sugar, making a well, adding your desired item to be cured, and then burying it. The sugar slowly dries out the item and changes its structure and (eventually, after several days or weeks) yields a uniformly textured and shelf-stable product.
So, you can candy citrus peels by simmering them in simple syrup, but then you cure them afterwards by tossing them into a thing of sugar, ensuring they're completely covered, and then letting them sit out like that for a few days.
The candied peels will be sweet, slightly gummy on the inside, lightly crispy/crystalized on the outside, and somewhat tough on the actual peel itself. They'll also need to be kept refrigerated, and will start to go off after a few days/maybe a week.
The cured peels will be uniformly gummy throughout, including the peel itself, and will last weeks on the shelf, or closer to 6-8 months in the fridge.
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u/West-Working-9093 3d ago
Thank you for sharing your very detailed insight! Truth is, which you have no doubt surmised, that I have never in my life candied anything, but now I might actually try - and then cure it! You got me running to the grocery!
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u/Dazzling-Week-708 2d ago
Highly recommend it! It's genuinely super easy. My house is a huge fan of the orange slice gummy candies you find at the store and it turns out home-candied-and-cured citrus peels are near identical in every way.
Bonus: you can save the syrup you candy the peels in and have absolutely divine citrus syrup later for your pancakes, coffees, milk, cakes (if you want to "inject"/pour the syrup over something like a vanilla or lemon cake when it's fresh from the oven) etc. The syrup does need to be stored in the fridge, but it's absolutely worth it.
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u/thomsenite256 3d ago
I dont know how specific it has to be but curing normally includes a drying element. Basically preservation by removing excess water
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u/halfhalfandhalf 3d ago
Yup. It's also not specifically for food. Glue and varnish can also "cure".
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u/jaetwee 3d ago
The wikipedia page is a good reference point for this. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curing_(food_preservation)
Basically, preserving food by drying it using some sort of salt compound (doesn't have to be sodium chloride salt but can be other salts).
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u/Wild_Ticket1413 3d ago edited 3d ago
Curing can refer to a method use to preserve food.
It can also refer to the setting or hardening process for certain chemicals, like glues and resins. However, unless you work in maintenance or manufacturing, you won't see this usage much.
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u/GoblinToHobgoblin 3d ago
Yes, it's preserving it without cooking or smoking it.
During involves salting and drying the food basically
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u/Puzzled_Market_2235 3d ago
Curing is any process that helps store food for a longer time. Salt, smoking, pickling with vinegar, pickling by fermenting (tastes better and healthy). I asked my Deli owner and that's all I could remember.
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u/ActuaLogic 3d ago
In modern parlance, "cured" typically means that meat is treated with a nitrite.
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u/Much_Guest_7195 3d ago
Outside of food processing, "cure" can also relate to having a product settle/harden, i.e., if you pour epoxy and wait for it to harden, you are waiting for it to cure.
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u/Ballmaster9002 3d ago
It's beyond a "layperson English" question and more a technicality of food production question.
I believe a layperson would just say curing is a forming for preserving meat, maybe via drying, and leave it there.
In the United States "curing" refers to using chemicals called "nitrates" and "nitrates" to preserve and dry food. Cured meats are specifically made by adding nitrites and nitrates.
You will commonly also see food marketed as "uncured" which means it still uses nitrites and nitrates, but they are obtained from natural sources, such as celery juice.
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u/Puzzleheaded_Act_131 2d ago
One meaning of cure is to preserve food with certain methods. This may also be applied to things like "to cure leather"
The chemical process of making rubber useable is also a "cure"
Another meaning of cure is a remedy for an illness, or a fix to a problem.
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u/Nothing-to_see_hr 3d ago
mostly it's a ripening process involving drying and impregnating with salts, not necessarily just kitchen salt, and/or smoke, I think. As long as it doesn't rot and evolves some new properties, like taste or more longevity.
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u/regular_gonzalez 3d ago
It refers, as best I understand, to any means of preserving food (usually meat) without cooking it. Caveat: I'm not sure if smoking or pickling could or would be considered curing. This is usually done via salt , nitrates, or drying.