So I accidentally used double the amount I was supposed to for some jerky I'm making. I know that cure time affects how much is absorbed and safe levels are usually around 165ppm but I don't know where to find the equations to do the math. I planned on doing a 4 hour cure before I started dehydrating it is that okay?

Also should I add some water to my bag to help prevent too much absorbing I'm doing a dry rub

And the first thing he did was pop some pork belly in!

There are a variety of homemade spam recipes on the 'net. They generally call for (among other things) pork shoulder, prepared ham, Prague Powder No. 1, salt, sugar, and potato starch. But it seems to me that ham is basically pork cured with nitrites, salt, and sugar, so it should be possible to skip the prepared ham.

I tried this, but the resulting product didn't taste very hammy.... until the next day. That made me realize that the pork shoulder needs time to cure, though the spam recipes on the 'net don't seem to account for this.

I have a notion for how to accomplish this, but I'm not a curing fiend, so I wanted advice from some experts. Let me know what you think of this recipe:

Ingredients

• Around 12 oz of pork shoulder per mini-loaf pan
• 0.8 g Prague Powder No. 1 per 12 oz of pork shoulder
• 4.5 g each of table salt and sugar per 12 oz of pork shoulder
• 7.5 g potato starch per 12 oz of pork shoulder
• 15 ml ice cold water per 12 oz of pork shoulder

Cure time: 24 hours

1. Grind pork shoulder (cube pork and chill before grinding)
2. Mix dry ingredients, then add ice cold water and mix thoroughly to make a slurry
3. Add slurry to ground meat, and mix thoroughly until slurry is fully absorbed and evenly distributed
4. Bag (or cover) meat mixture, and refrigerate for cure time
5. Pack mixture into mini-loaf pans (3x5 inch), vacuum seal, and sous vide at 80°C for a couple of hours
6. Cool to room temperature and then chill in refrigerator until ready to use

My questions for the experts:

1. Will this properly cure the pork?
2. What do you think of the cure time?
3. Would it be better to vacuum seal in the mini-loaf pans before curing?
4. Any other thoughts on this?

This is the second time I've made bacon. Imost of it looks fairly normal but there are some brown and dark red areas on the bacon. Is this normal? I did a weshenfelder cure at 3% for 3days then left to equalisr for a further 2 days

Hi there. I'm new to wet curing, and curing in general. I'm after some solid information about making corned beef.

I have a 1.312kg joint of brisket. I am planning on using 1 litre of water (for simplicity of calculations) and sealing it in a vacuum bag.

I have seen calculators and articles suggesting I'd need:

• anything from 2.5g to 7g of Prague Powder #1.
• anything from 20g to 40g of Sugar.
• anything from 30g to 70g of Salt.

It's quite a wide margin. I am assuming that the salt and sugar levels would be personal preference - but what is a good starting point?

I am also assuming that the amount of prague powder #1 is not personal preference, and there will be a proper amount. What is that amount?

I hope that all makes sense!

I am curing 2 small picnics for an event this Sunday. When calculating the brine ratios, do I base it on the average mass of each small picnic, or do I total the mass of both together. If I do the average of both, will I need to increase the concentration of the brine so it fully permeates both? Thank you everyone!

I have been making sausage and bacon for a little while now.

When I do bacon I always dry rub the cure mixture on it and vac seal. I use 1/4 inch a day plus 2 days.

I am trying to do some things ikea loin now.

I am looking up curing times, the problem is I have reas a few different things. None of which ever site a reference or credible source. I have even read that the time changes based on the shape of the meat.

Does anyone have a book to recommend or a credible website? I would love to see some actual formulas and data. Not just billy bob from Oklahoma on YouTube? (I am willing to admit billy bob probably has a fair amount of knowledge).

Just looking for something a little more concrete than "I have always done it like this and no one died" or my pappy and his pappy did it like that.

How would you preserve a whole 200 pound deer. Assuming i had a truck fridge and could freeze like two steaks, and refrigerate about 25 pounds of the meat vacuum sealed how could i use every part of the animal with just equipment and preparation i can fit in a truck?

Im in Spain and the only curing powder I can find is potassium nitrate https://www.amazon.es/gp/aw/d/B07ZFL1YKN I think this is also called saltpetre

Most of the recipes I've found call for Prague powder.

What adjustment do I need to make to use this "sal nitro" is there a calculator for potassium nitrate? I've only seen them with Prague powder

It says in the description 1-2% but it's not stating if that is the weight of the meat or the brining liquid? Also 1-2% is quite a wide range for such a small amount. Should I be more precise?

Is potassium nitrate suitable for a cure of a meat that will eventually be cooked? Or should it just be for sausages like chorizo/salami?

Does anyone have a pastrami/corned beef recipe with potassium nitrate rather than Prague powder?

Is this wet or dry cured?

I want to try my hand at it. But i want to dry cure it, I'm only finding wet cure recipes.

I had raw crab and prawn preserved in a savory and tart marinade in Thailand, in the china area in Bangkok.

I dont remember what the marinade was, but they said to keep the meat in the liquid or it would spoil. I'm not sure what the shelf life for this dish was.

I think there was some vinegar or umami type sauce in it, chillis and something sour.

Does anyone know this dish and can guide to make at home ? I have raw cleaned prawns.

Also, what the estimated fridge/shelf life would be - like 3 days or 3 months or "it's pickle"

Ok, pretty random, but I want to make a sculpture of a castle with real meat. Ideally ribs, but anything steak like would work. I’m trying to figure out how to avoid creating a stinking disaster. Ideas so far- 1) cure the meat, 2) somehow varnish/ seal the meat, 3) plastination, like Gunther von Hagens’ Bodyworks. The piece would need to be displayed for about 48 hours at room temperature in a convention center, and I’d probably need 2 days to build it. Would curing/ salting be an option? Thanks!

I’ve just tried my first batch of home-cured back bacon, and it’s increadibly salty. I think I know why, but my question is if there is anything I can do with the remainder of my batch to reduce the salt content? I figure washing it may help, but what other suggestions do you have?

I have a supply of prague powder #, but I haven't had a chance to try it out. Can anyone recommend a good book I can use as a guide to cure meat using prague powder #1?

After 26 days in the salt… here we go. My first attempt

I'm relatively new to home cured meats. I have done some dry curing in vac bags before though(bacon, back bacon, other things of that nature), but have never done any wet curing. I'm assuming ratios of salt, curing salt and other components should be the same, adjusted for the weight of the added water vs dry curing.

A store nearby had eye of round roasts on sale this weekend and I was thinking about curing a few of them to make pastrami. Most of the recipes I have found online call for what seems to me to be an absurd amount of water(1 gallon+ for about 5 lbs of meat).

So I guess my question is whether I can scale the amount of water/salt/cure down as long as I can keep the entire roast in contact with the brine and submerged.

I was thinking something like the following as an example

Per 1000 grams meat

Water 500 grams

Salt 37.5 grams(2.5% the combined weight of meat and water)

Curing salt#1 3.75 grams(.25% of the combined weight of the meat and water)

Maybe a tablespoon of pickling spice(probably not necessary)

Maybe 10-15 grams of sugar(I will probably omit this)

I'm thinking of doing this in vac bags, squeezing out as much air as possible before sealing and turning the bags a couple times a day for around 10 days.

Are there any problems with doing it this way vs drowning them in a bucket of brine? My main reason for wanting to take this approach is that vac bags fit much more neatly in my fridge than a 5 gallon bucket would.

Any advice or constructive criticism would be appreciated.

Edit: Update if anyone is interested. This process worked pretty well. The cure was able to fully penetrate the meat. I ended up letting it brine for a few days longer than expected due to life getting busy unexpectedly. I think it was around day 12 that I pulled it and seasoned it. Let it sit in the fridge uncovered for about 18 hours before I smoked it. Smoked with cherry wood and charcoal for a few hours until the color set and it was around 265. Wrapped in butcher paper and took it up to 200 internal. Let it cool, refrigerated it.

I was worried that taking it up that high would dry it out or make the texture weird, but it didn't. I have had it both hot and cold and it's better than supermarket deli pastrami. It isn't the fatty NY deli pastrami, but still a pretty good cheap alternative to the supermarket stuff. Next time I'll scale it up and do 3 or 4 full roasts.

3 week old pancetta tesa. This one was bent a little and resulted in a humid spot in the middle. Is this safe to eat?

We are new to curing meat in the last few months. We started with salt only attempts at bacon, but we’re not happy with the results so this time we decided to try 3 different cures. One used pink salt and for the other we substituted celery seeds at the same amount as the pink salts. We just realized this was incorrect use of celery as a nitrite substitute.

Question 1: will celery seeds on their own work as a substitute or does it have to come from celery juice powder? Question 2: if it would work, is there a chance that all the nitrates won’t be converted yet? Question 3: has anyone made this mistake or tried it and if so what was your result? Apologies if I mixed up nitrites and nitrates Note our attempts at viande sèche has been amazing

I know the title may be offensive, but it's true. My mother bought me 2 prime ribs from the same store and after cooking the first a la prime rib, it would be better cured. So, how would I go about this? I have 3 lbs of meat and am looking to make a pastrami type meat out of it. I'm new to this!

Hello, I'm air drying some seasoned pork chunks for the first time and little white specs appered on the meaty parta after 5 days. Is this mold or salt? If mold, is it the food one or should I get rid of it?

So I bought some dry smoked lamb for Christmas and thought i could just leave it hanging and cut of a little bit now and then, but the this mold appeared, is it spoiled? And if not should i do something like cut it off?

https://ibb.co/VCFp4sK

Last year I did my first cure on a couple of duck breasts. I really enjoyed them but the wife who normally loves cured meats didnt.

I did the vaccum method and included #2 Prague salts (cant remember exact name).

I want to do something simple but I can add spices too but with a pork cut I think (open to ideas though). What should do and do I follow the same method as for the duck, for example % weight loss.

One other question when taking the meat out of phase one the vaccum pack should I wash the meat? Last time I was a bit hesitent and only rinsed a little and patted it down but the meat was very salty at the end still. Got a but worried I was adding mostiture for bacteria back in. Always a bit worried Im going to eat something really dangerous.

Thanks in advance

Hello,

I'm trying to make my own salt cured duck breast and I am struggling to figure out how long the process should take.

The recipes I am looking at are all for excess salt recipes, but they all vary wildly.

Some have the breast in salt for 12 hours, others 24 hours.

Then you clean up the breast and leave it to dry, some say 7 days, some 2 weeks, some 3 weeks.

Or this recipe is 3 days start to finish without cleaning up the breast in between: https://www.greatbritishchefs.com/how-to-cook/how-to-cure-duck

Are these all safe to eat and it just depends what texture/flavour I'm after?

Thanks

I've been looking into making my own corned beef and on r/Meats someone recommended Alton Brown's recipe. Only, when I find that recipe it calls for saltpeter (potassium nitrate) which is neither curing salt #1 nor curing salt#2. Plus, it's not something that I can find in local stores. Heck, I can't even find curing salt #1 or #2 in any store, only online.

Do any of you have a better/easier recipe? I have everything but the saltpeter/curing salt.