Arthur Ave Lamb Prosciutto

February 27, 2016 by AOG 4 Comments

Lamb prosciutto, or prosciutto d’agnello can either be made with the bone in or bone out. If it is made with the bone in, it is slightly harder to deal with, and it is harder to slice on a commercial slicer. If it is made bone out, you have to deal with the air pockets that the removal of the bone creates. There are two ways to deal with this; you can cure it in two separate pieces with no potential for air pockets, or you can cure it in one piece by tying it together as tightly as possible to eliminate any air pockets (some people use meat glue to eliminate any chances of air pockets when following this procedure). Air pockets are dangerous because they create an anaerobic environment which can promote the growth of dangerous bacteria.

My first attempt at lamb prosciutto turned out remarkably well, even with as little as I knew at the time. I bought a bone out leg of lamb, and cured it in two separate pieces. You can see the details here: Lamb Prosciutto Attempt #1.

Since my initial attempt, I have made lamb prosciutto again:

The second time, emboldened my previous success, I decided I wanted to try to cure a bone out leg of lamb, tied tightly together in one piece. I bought a bone out leg of lamb from a specialty Italian butcher, who butchered it and tied it together like you would for a roast.

The third time, I decided to go back to my method of splitting the bone out leg of lamb into two pieces to cure, in order to experiment with two different spice cure.

In the future, I plan to cure a bone in leg of lamb, and hand slice it with my cuchillo jamonero, or my specialty jamón carving knife.

Here, I will detail the process that I followed for my second lamb prosciutto attempt. In a future post, I will discuss the lamb prosciutto that I cured most recently using two different winter spice cures.

I was able to buy a leg of lamb from an Italian butcher shop at Arthur Ave in the Bronx. I explained to the butcher there what I wanted, and he took the time to tightly tie the leg of lamb together into a roast.

Curing (3 weeks):

I have updated the curing ratios to reflect my most recently used values.

I allowed the leg of lamb to sit in the cure for 3 weeks under vacuum seal.

Casing (1 hour):

The meat was cased in a 100 mm collagen casing. After this, a toothpick was used to puncture any air holes that may have been evident and could harbor the growth of bad bacteria.

I then sprayed my meat with Bactoferm Mold 600, which is a single strain culture that contains freeze-dried form spores of Penicillium nalgiovense. This promotes beneficial mold growth and tends to keep any potentially dangerous mold growths at bay.

Drying (1 month+, until 30% of weight is lost):

Temperature: 54F/12C, Humidity: 70-80% RH

The lamb prosciutto was put directly into the curing chamber at this point. If you have read my first lamb prosciutto post, you know that I used to use a fermentation stage step. I have found this to be unnecessary for whole muscle cured products, and now move directly from the curing and casing stages to the drying stage.

The meat was allowed to lose ~30% of its initial weight, and was pulled from the chamber.

It was taken out of its casing, rinsed off with white vinegar, and patted dry.

Tasting:

Ahhh the flavor of lamb prosciutto, one of my all time favorites.

This one looked a little gnarly, due to the butcher string that kept it together.

Sliced thin, the taste was great…

However, compared to my previous attempts, I didn’t love the aesthetics of this final product. That is why for my next attempt, I cured my lamb prosciutto in two pieces. I also will be trying a bone in lamb prosciutto in the future to avoid this problem. This product was stored under vacuum seal.

Disclaimer: Meat curing is a hobby that comes with inherent risks. We can all do things to limit this risk by educating ourselves about the process and the utilizing the safest known methods to create our products. This website is for educational purposes only, and all experimentation should be done at each individuals own risk.

Goat Prosciutto

February 25, 2016 by AOG Leave a Comment

Goat prosciutto caught my eye early on when I was learning the craft of curing meat. Luckily, I have access to a large number of halal butchers, and was able to procure a bone in leg of goat fairly easily. This is the first cured meat product I made that was bone in, and I was excited about the possibility. Because of how lean a leg of goat is, this project is done fairly quickly, so it is a good project if you are looking for one with a quicker turnaround.

Goat prosciutto is also called violino di capra, occasionally prosciutto di capra, or mocetta (when it is bone out). It gets the name violino di capra because when one is carving the cured meat product, it looks like one is playing the violin (not the easiest process to take a photo of when you are by yourself). Melodious AND tasty, you can’t beat that.

Curing (suggested 2 weeks):

So, this project was a bit of a mess from the start. I bought the goat leg on a bit of a whim because it looked so beautiful that I couldn’t resist.

I didn’t have my scale with my at the time, so I couldn’t weigh my ingredients. I also didn’t have some of my critical ingredients, such as nitrates, which I had to add halfway into the curing process. Basically, I picked some spices I thought would go well with goat, measured by eye, and added them to the curing mixture. (See my other for posts for suggested curing ratios to use)

The spice cure was rubbed on the goat leg and it was allowed to cure.

My suggested cure time is 2 weeks, but because I got distracted and busy, this one stayed in the cure about 6 weeks.

Casing (1 hour):

After I remembered the meat was hanging out in my fridge in the cure, I rinsed it off and patted it dry.

A bone in piece of meat is a difficult one to case. We ended up using a 100 mm collagen casing, which served its purpose.

It was tied in butcher string, and hung in the curing chamber to dry.

Drying (1 month+, until 30% of weight is lost):

Temperature: 54F/12C, Humidity: 70-80% RH

The meat was weighed and tracked for weight loss during its time in the curing chamber.

It was allowed to lose ~30% of its initial weight, and was pulled from the chamber.

Tasting:

So… my first tasting of this product was, underwhelming. It was overly salted (due to my inexact cure) and didn’t have the beautiful bright red color I expected to see (perhaps due to my late addition of nitrates).

However, after spending a few months under vacuum seal, I tried it again, and the flavor was much improved!

It still was too salty for my taste, but it had a great, strong meaty flavor that came out. It is stored under vacuum seal in my fridge now, taken out for tastings along the way.

My goal is to redo this experiment, with a carefully measured cure, and hopefully create an even better final product.

Turkey Bresaola

February 24, 2016 by AOG 1 Comment

So, let’s delve into some lesser known versions of bresaola. Bresaola di tacchino, or turkey breasaola, is a lesser well known cured meat product. I have seen it advertised in Italian as a “healthy” alternative to the traditional cured meats which may be red meat based and have a higher fat content. I don’t know if one could really consider it healthier, not do I really care too much. I believe that in moderation, there is nothing wrong with making and eating cured meats. This is especially true when you make your own and control the quality of meat and levels of salt and nitrates that go into it. My interest in bresaola di tacchino was mostly curiosity driven. I had never tried it before, and was very curious about the flavor that a cured and dried turkey product would have.

Honestly, I don’t like turkey. I think it’s a waste of a meat. Thanksgiving is only redeemed by the Italian food we use to accompany it, and I never would consider adding turkey as a cold cut to any sandwich. Before I made the bresaola di tacchino, turkey bacon was the only turkey product I liked. Fried and crispy, although not the same as regular pork bacon, I was able to see its appeal.

I bought a large turkey breast from Wegmans with the idea in mind to make it into turkey bacon. That never happened, and my smoker situation was up in the air at the time, so after keeping it in the freezer for a couple of months, I decided to pull it out and to try to make the elusive bresaola di tacchino. When I started this project, I had the lowest of low hopes, and just did it, basically to see what would happen.

Best. Decision. Ever.

Curing (2 weeks):

The turkey.

It was difficult to find much information online about people who have cured their own bresaola di tacchino. I found a few recipes in Italian that were done in very traditional ways, and not ideal for what I wanted to do. So I did what any good experimenter does; I made it up. I tried to create a cure that would complement the turkey, and followed my basic operating procedure.

I was slightly worried because turkey is poultry, and I know it can be more prone to carry certain diseases, but I didn’t find too much information on any changes that needed to be made when curing turkey compared to other meats, so I went ahead as usual. I assume that the usual safeguards can help prevent the spread of disease in most cases, but if you plan on doing this yourself, please be sure to do your own research on safety issues and make sure you are comfortable with the risk level.

The bresaola di tacchino was rubbed in the cure spices, and then placed in a vacuum sealed bag in order to cure for 2 weeks.

After the bresaola di tacchino was cured for 2 weeks, the cure was rinsed off and the turkey patted dry.

Casing (1 hour):

I encased the bresaola di tacchino in a beef bung casing and used butcher string to wrap it up. I used a clean toothpick was used to puncture any air holes that may have been evident and could harbor the growth of bad bacteria.

I didn’t spray this meat with Bactoferm Mold 600 (Penicillium nalgiovense) but I put it in the curing chamber with meats that had been inoculated, so over time the mold jumped onto it. The use of penicillium nalgiovense promotes beneficial mold growth and tends to keep any potentially dangerous mold growths at bay.

Drying (1 month+, until 30% of weight is lost):

Temperature: 54F/12C, Humidity: 70-80% RH

After being cased, the bresaola di tacchino was weighted.

It was hung to dry in the curing chamber, set to its usual settings, and its weight lost over time was tracked.

It was allowed to lose ~30% of its initial weight, and was pulled from the chamber.

The bresaola di tacchino was uncased and rinsed down with white vinegar and patted dry.

Tasting:

Now. This is where I was surprised. I pulled the bresaola di tacchino, rather unenthusiastically, with a few other experiments I was more excited about to be frank. I sliced them up and offered them around. Unanimously, we ALL decided that was LOVED the bresaola di tacchino. The other meats were good, but this one was FANTASTIC.

To this day, I don’t know why this particular product was so good, and it desperately needs to be repeated. The meat quality was great, the spices were right on, and the texture was perfect. If you are looking for a unique curing project, perhaps one that is kosher or halal, this is one you don’t want to miss.

It also goes perfect on a plate with other cured meats. This charcuterie plate has my homemade turkey bresaola, beef bresaola, duck prosciutto, and lamb prosciutto.

Ribeye Bresaola

February 22, 2016 by AOG Leave a Comment

Traditionally, bresaola has been made with lean pieces of beef. This is because with traditional curing methods the beef fat gets oxidized fairly easily and it goes rancid (compared to pork fat, where this process happens much more slowly). Traditional methods didn’t have many ways to reduce this oxidation, so they used beef without much fat for preservations sake.

However, using modern methods we can eliminate some of the oxidation that occurs. We use nitrates, refrigeration, and vacuum sealing to limit and slow down the oxidation process.

One method that people use to prevent beef fat oxidation is the addition of vitamin E or α-tocopherol to their products. This can be done by adding α-tocopherol powder or something called rosemary extract, which despite its name, does not give a particularly rosemary-ish flavor to the meat. Vitamin E acts as an antioxidant and can slow down beef fat oxidation. However, I have not tried this method yet. Simply by using my regular modern curing procedure, I have been able to avoid beef fat rancidity.

Being able to prevent beef fat rancidity opens up a whole new world of meat curing. Cuts of beef that are high in fat that have traditionally never been cured are now able to be easily cured and enjoyed. I have been eyeing up the fatty ribeye roast cut for a while, and eventually made the jump to curing it once I found a particularly appealing ribeye roast at my local Costco.

The process of making a ribeye bresaola is not very different from my traditional method, but I will detail below the steps that I took.

Curing (3 weeks):

I followed my traditional bresaola recipe for the meat. I have updated the cure information to reflect my currently used ratios.

I cured my meat in a ziplock bag due to its larger and bulkier size. In addition, in order to make sure that my equilibrium cure had time to penetrate the entire cut of meat, I extended the time in the cure up to 3 weeks.

Casing (1 hour):

As I’ve said before, I love using beef bung casings for my whole muscle cured meats. For this one, we cut open beef middles and used them to wrap the meat. After the ribeye bresaola was cased, we used a toothpick was used to puncture any air holes.

We used butcher string to tie it up and get it ready to hang. We sprayed it was a solution of Bactoferm Mold 600 (a single strain culture that contains freeze-dried form spores of Penicillium nalgiovense). This promotes beneficial mold growth and tends to keep any potentially dangerous mold growths at bay.

Drying (1 month+, until 30% of weight is lost):

Temperature: 54F/12C, Humidity: 70-80% RH

After casing, the ribeye bresaola was put directly into the curing chamber. This one took a little bit longer, which was expected due to its large size and higher fat content. Fat doesn’t lose water weight like muscle meat does, so products with higher fat content tend to lose less weight.

Eventually, the meat lost ~30% of its initial weight, and was pulled from the chamber.

Tasting:

This end product was an awesome and unique experience. Fat is really an essential part of what makes cured meats taste so good, and this was no exception.

Having fat in a beef bresaola product really enhances its flavor and made it a more complex product.

Because beef fat has a higher melting point, or slip melting point as the scientific literature refers to it as, it doesn’t melt at room temperature like most pork fat will. I found that leaving the meat out for an hour or so before serving helped to make the fat more delectable, giving it a better mouthfeel. In a future post, I will discuss the melting points of different fats and their pros and cons for different products.

Overall, I thought this was a great experiment. I have it stored vacuumed sealed in my fridge, and pull it out for an occasional treat every now and then. If you haven’t done a fatty bresaola yet but have been eyeing up some fattier beef cuts, or have some on hand, go ahead. You might just love it.

Coffee Cured Bresaola

February 12, 2016 by AOG Leave a Comment

I decided to make some different types of bresaola for the winter holidays. Since I love coffee, and I love cured meats, this has been an experiment that has been a long time coming; coffee cured bresaola.

Curing (2 weeks):

I decided to experiment with a coffee cured bresaola, using coffee and other winter spices to cure a piece of eye round roast. The eye round was mixed with the cure and allowed to sit in the refrigerator vacuum sealed for 2 weeks or so.

Casing (1 hour):

After the meat had cured for about 2 weeks, I took it out of the cure. I rinsed off the spices and patted it dry. I then cased the bresaola in beef bung casings, and used butcher netting to tie it up.

Drying (1 month+, until 30% of weight is lost):

Temperature: 54F/12C, Humidity: 70-80% RH

The bresaola was put directly into the curing chamber and allowed to lose ~30% of its initial weight, and was pulled from the chamber.

Tasting:

This one was interesting. I took off the casing first. Even at over 30% weight loss, it still seemed to be more moist than my usual bresaola.

I used white vinegar to clean off the outside of the bresaola. The coffee flavor was subtle, but complimented the meat.

After the initial tasting, the bresaola was vacuum packed for a mini vacation and will be re-tasted again soon!

Traditional Bresaola

February 12, 2016 by AOG 4 Comments

I have made bresaola in a number of different ways since my first bresaola experiment and learned tons. I have made more bresaola in the original way described in most charcuterie books. I have made bresaola using a traditional Italian recipe that utilizes red wine that was detailed to me by an Italian friend who has been doing this for ages. I have experimented with unique spice cures. And I have also used different cuts of beef to make new types of bresaola. Here, I will update my traditional bresaola process. Future posts will details some of the variations that I have tried.

Curing (2 weeks):

I have updated my curing ratios in the past few years based off of my experience, research, and discussions with other people who cure their own meat. These ratios reflect my personal preferences and can be changed according to taste, but the salt and cure #2 represent a minimum value, and less should not be used. The cure was rubbed onto the meat, and vacuum sealed. It was allowed to cure in the fridge for two weeks.

Casing (1 hour):

Beef bungs are my casing of choice for bresaola when I have them on hand. Sometimes, it’s time to case the meat, and I realize I am out. In these times, I use collagen casings. If I’m out of both of these, cheesecloth will work. In this case, I used beef bungs. I soak them in water before using them to allow them to stretch out before using them to case the bresaola.

After the bresaola was cased, a toothpick was used to puncture any air holes that may have been evident and could harbor the growth of bad bacteria.

Sometimes, I spray my meat with Bactoferm Mold 600, which is a single strain culture that contains freeze-dried form spores of Penicillium nalgiovense. This promotes beneficial mold growth and tends to keep any potentially dangerous mold growths at bay. However, after years of using a curing chamber, the chamber itself will tend to become inoculated with the mold culture itself, making spraying the meat directly less necessary.

Drying (1 month+, until 30% of weight is lost):

Temperature: 54F/12C, Humidity: 70-80% RH

The bresaola was put directly into the curing chamber at this point. If you have read my first bresaola post, you know that I used to use a fermentation stage step. I have found this to be unnecessary for whole muscle cured products, and now move directly from the curing and casing stages to the drying stage.

The meat was allowed to lose ~30% of its initial weight, and was pulled from the chamber.

Tasting:

Ahhh….the taste of a home cured bresaola, tender and flavorful never gets old.

Mosciame

February 5, 2016 by AOG 4 Comments

Seaside breezes. The smell of salt and sea in the air. Gorgeous grottos set against a dark blue sea. Sicily. The land of my ancestors, calling to me. When I picture the beauty of this mysterious island, with its rich culture and heritage, I can’t help but feel drawn back to it. And, when I come down from my reverie, and realize it’s not pragmatic to go jumping off to Sicily on a whim on a random Wednesday, like any true Italian, I connect to my heritage with a culinary project.

Mosciame is a charcuterie project that I had been wanting to do for a while. My first taste of this illusive treat was on a trip with the family back to Sicily. At the time I didn’t know, or fully appreciate, what I was eating. After I started to become invested in making my own cured meats, I rediscovered this curiously attractive project and became adamant that it was a project I needed to do.

Mosciame is traditionally made in fishing villages, where tuna has been prevalent and finding a means to preserve it was a necessity. It has been said that the Phoenicians were the first to cure tuna, and even used it as a currency of a sort, which would make sense given their history as a sea faring peoples who set up many port towns. The Phoenicians were well known for their ability to convert salt water to salt, a precious commodity at the time. They were able to use the salt that they procured to preserve the abundant tuna that they caught in the waters surrounding Sicily. Because of this history, mosciame tends to be made in areas where the Phonecians had a large cultural influence. This includes the islands of Sicily and Sardegna, as well as in some areas of Spain.

Mosciame is known by many names; in Italy it is mosciame, in Spain it is mojama, in Portugal it is muxama, and I am sure that I am missing many names, in many dialects. It is thought that the name is derived from an Arabic word, although the exact derivation is not agreed upon. Some say that it is from the Arabic word musama which means dry. While others say that it is from the word mosammed, meaning a thing that is hard and dry. Others say it is from the Arabic word almuxama. Not being an expert in Arabic or word derivations, I cannot really claim to know which of these have more truth behind it, but suffice it to say, it is most likely a word derived from Arabic due to their influence in the culture of these regions.

Today, most mosciame is made from tuna, specifically the loin of the tuna. Traditionally, it was also made with dolphin. In reality, just like most charcuterie, it probably can be made with other fish as well and is just awaiting brave experimenters to jump in and unknowingly try to replicate a lost local secret of some remote village.

There are quite a few ways to go ahead making mosciame. There is the traditional way, which I did not try to replicate but will explain for anyone who is a pure traditionalist to try. There is a traditional modern adaptation which I tried here. There is also the more modern way, which is how I do most of my cured meat projects, with variations on certain aspects of it. I will detail the process that I followed for my first modern style mosciame attempt below.

Traditional: The tuna loin or belly is harvested from the whole fish and it is cleaned and washed. It is packed in excess salt and is allowed to stay in the excess salt cure for 48 hours. After 2 days, the salt is washed off, and the tuna is patted dry. At this point, the tuna is hung outside to dry, preferably in a cool place with a good sea breeze for 2-3 weeks. Many Sicilians hang their homemade mosciame out in their backyard, some even utilizing their clotheslines for the purpose!

First Modern Trial: In my case, I bought a piece of sushi grade tuna loin.

Curing (48 hours):

I used equilibrium curing in order to cure the fish, using a mix of salt, cure #2, spices, and the starter culture B-LC-007.

Only salt and cure #2 are necessary. Spices can be adjusted based on personal preference. In this case, I added a starter culture to give the meat an extra earthy flavor, but it was more of an experiment than anything else and definitely not necessary.

After the meat was allowed to equilibrium cure for 48 hours, the cure was washed off and the meat was patted dry.

Casing: (1 hour)

Then, the meat was stuffed into a beef bung casing.

Drying (1 month+, until 30% of weight is lost):

Temperature: 54F/12C, Humidity: 70-80% RH

It was added into the curing chamber and allowed to lose 30% of its initial weight.

After the meat lost 30% of its weight, I pulled it from the chamber.

First, I pulled off the beef bung casing.

Then, I rinsed the outside off with white vinegar, patted it dry, and rubbed some olive oil on the outside of it.

Tasting: The mosciame was sliced, and boy oh boy did it hit me.

This meat was the most powerfully flavorful of any that I have made. Personally, I really enjoyed the end product. It was a full, strong earthy almost yeasty product that was as complex as it was beautiful. However, like a good cheese, it had a strong smell that was off putting to some. I find that it is great paired with some olives and wine, or on top of a dish of papas bravas.

The mosciame was stored under vacuum in the fridge for future tastings.

Disclaimer: Curing fish is a hobby that comes with inherent risks. We can all do things to limit this risk by educating ourselves about the process and the utilizing the safest known methods to create our products. This website is for educational purposes only, and all experimentation should be done at each individuals own risk.

Duck Prosciutto

January 24, 2016 by AOG 8 Comments

While I have previously written about making whole muscle cures, I have learned a lot since my initial attempts which I chronicled at the time. As I am constantly learning and adapting methods, my next few posts will discuss some of the whole muscle cures that I have made more recently, and the specific protocols or recipes that I have used. If you are looking for an overview of meat curing, please refer back to my charcuterie page introduction.

Duck Prosciutto, or prosciutto d’anatra, is a delicious cured meat product made by curing duck breasts. It can be made a few different ways, two of which I will detail here.

Duck Prosciutto is a cured meat product that many suggest as an entry level cured meat. While that may be the case due to its small size and short curing time, the layer of fat on the breast as well as traditional casing methods can complicate things. In fact, my first duck prosciutto attempt was actually my first cured meat failure. I had uneven drying, and instead if using a method to even it out, I considered it a failure and threw it out.

(I now know better, and if any of my products have uneven drying or case hardening, I make sure that I vacuum seal them and leave them in a traditional refrigerator for an unspecified period of time until they have evened out. At this point, they can be rehung until they reach the desired water weight loss point.)

A traditional duck breast is part meat, with a thick layer of fat on one side.

Because of the makeup of fat compared to protein, the fatty portion of the duck breast has less water to lose than the meat portion of the duck breast. This is important to know when deciding when a duck prosciutto is ready, since the target of 30% water weight loss might take longer than expected to reach (and in fact, may not be necessary depending on how much fat the cut really has!)

Method #1: Equilibrium Curing

Deciding on a spice cure for a duck prosciutto is 100% personal preference after the necessary additional of salt, and in my opinion, nitrates or cure #2 as I will refer to it from here on out. While some people use excess curing for duck prosciutto, I have switched over to using equilibrium curing completely. For more information on this, see the charcuterie introduction. This winter I decided to make two different duck prosciutto, one using more traditional bresaola spices and one that was a play on the French dish of duck l’orange.

Curing (2 weeks):

The duck breasts were mixed with the spice cure and vacuum sealed in a bag and allowed to equilibrate in a traditional refrigerator for the period of two weeks.

Casing (1 hour):

After the two weeks of curing was up, the duck breasts were washed off of all spices and patted dry.

They were cased in beef bungs, and wrapped in butchers netting.

If you refer to older posts, at this point, I used to do a fermentation stage for whole muscle cures. I have come to the conclusion that that is only really necessary for salami, and have stopped doing a fermentation stage for whole muscle cures.

Drying (1 month+, until 30% of weight is lost):

Temperature: 54F/12C, Humidity: 70-80% RH

After casing, the duck prosciutto was hung in the curing chamber at around 55F/12C and around 80% RH.

I have been keeping my humidity higher than I have in the past to allow to slower and more even weight loss, as well as to accommodate the cheeses that I have been keeping in the curing chamber. In this case, the traditional bresaola spiced duck breast reached 30% weight loss first and was pulled. The duck prosciutto l’orange style plateaued at a weight loss of ~25%, most likely due to its high fat content. It was pulled after it plateaued.

Tasting:

The taste test may be the best part of the whole project. The beef bung casing and netting is removed and the meat is rinsed with red wine or white vinegar (personal preference) to remove any mold that may have gotten through the casing on to the meat before being patted dry. The meat can be sliced with a deli slicer or by hand. Hopefully, the results will be heavenly.

The duck prosciutto was hand sliced with my new jamon knife, resulting in thicker slices than the deli slicer produces. Perfect for some late night duck prosciutto snacking.

Tasting of the traditional spiced duck prosciutto:

Tasting of the l’orange style duck prosciutto:

The duck prosciutto was stored in a vacuum sealed bag for snacking at a later date.

Method #2: Excess Curing

Previously, in order to make duck prosciutto I followed the method that is in a lot of the traditional literature. Excess curing is a method where the meat is packed into excess salt and spices, and allowed to cure for anywhere from 24-72 hours.

Curing: First, I did an excess salt/cure #2 and spice cure for 3 days.

Casing: Then, I wiped off then cure, and hung it in a cheesecloth casing for drying.

Drying (2 weeks+): Temperature: 54F/12C, Humidity: 70% RH

The duck breast was weighed in order to track the weight loss over time.

I tracked the weight loss over time and found that it stagnated at about 20% weight loss with some case hardening.

In order to even it out, I placed it under vacuum seal.

Tasting: After it spent some time under vacuum seal, it evened out and ended up absolutely delicious.

These are the two most common methods used to make duck prosciutto. Everyone finds methods that they prefer, and as discussed previously, I have switched to equilibrium curing and beef bungs for more even and replicable drying in the future. However, that is not to say that the excess curing method won’t work for you. Feel free to play around with your curing and create products that make you happy.

3 Step Nova Lox

June 21, 2014 by AOG Leave a Comment

Lox. Lox. Lox. Down in my belly. Lox is one of those delicious foods that you can spend a whole life missing out on after one bad experience. My first experience trying lox was at a Bar/Bat Mitzvah reception, where I cautiously loaded it onto a bagel, took a bite, and was less than pleased with the results. It was a good 5 years or so before I tried it again. My next experience was life altering. At least, culinary life changing. The fatty flavor of the salmon, salty without being overpowering, paired with the spice profile of peppercorns and dill was utterly delicious. I think I ate lox for a week straight after that experience. It was another 3 or so years, fed up with the high price of lox and the lottery of whether it would be fresh and delicious or older and less so, when I decided it was high time I learn to make my own lox.

Lox is one of those foods that is fascinating to explore the instructions on how to make them because there are so many traditions intertwined with history, that each takes you down a path of exploration that can distract you all day. There are different traditional methods on making lox, as well as new innovations and fusion spice profiles that lead to endless ways to make lox.

After doing a good amount of research, I choose a path of doing a less salty cured and smoked Nova lox. Some lox is considered finished after it has been cured for the appropriate amount of time, while others are cold smoked after they are cured. It’s a matter of preference, time, and ability, but the Nova lox I had grown to love so much was cold smoked, so I had to take the extra step. This post will detail what I call my “3 Step Lox.”

The Fish

The first step is to buy or catch a salmon. You will want it filleted in half, with as many of the bones removed as possible. Wild, fresh salmon is the best, but you can work with what’s available.

Step #1: Dry Cure (10-12 hours)

The first step is to dry cure the salmon. Using a 1:1 cure of brown sugar and kosher salt, I completely covered the exposed salmon, coating all of the fish except for the skin. After adding the cure, I wrapped the fish in plastic wrap, although any container will really do if you are opposed to the use of plastic. I placed this overnight in the refrigerator, with a weight on top of it (textbooks) to help increase the surface area contact and pressure. The solute particles in the cure act to create an differential gradient, leading to osmosis of water out of the salmon and into the cure, so beware, this will leak into your fridge if you don’t be careful and place it on something that can catch the extra liquid. This is a good sign, and it means you are starting to cure the salmon.

Note: Some recipes only use a dry cure for a certain amount of time (the longer, the saltier). Others only use a wet cure. In the days when curing salmon was done due to necessity, the lox was a lot saltier because there was no refrigeration and the salt cure needed to keep the fish edible for longer periods of time. In today’s world, curing salmon is done largely for the culinary pleasure of it. Because of that reason, we can get away with using much less salt/less curing time than traditional recipes call for. In the end, it’s what you prefer and can eat safely.

For the sake of experimentation, I first tried making lox using this 3 step method of a dry cure, a wet cure, and cold smoking. There is room to change any and all of the ratios/times listed here, and I have played around with most parameters. I have found that I prefer the results of this “3 Step Lox” to other methods when I have the time to make it. When I don’t, I make my “Quick Lox.”

Step #2: Wet Cure (10-12 hours)

The salmon is washed in cold water to clean off all of the dry cure. After this, it is submerged in a wet cure (brine) composed of salt and white sugar that are dissolved in water (1 L of water, 70 grams of salt, 4 grams of white sugar- scale up or down based on need). I use a vacuum sealer and associated vacuum sealable bags to submerge the salmon in the brine. This is put in the fridge overnight again.

Note: After the wet cure stage is done, you have cured salmon. The last stage, smoking the salmon, is an additional step that was sometimes done in order to further preserve the fish, being a convenient way to increase its edible lifespan given the ubiquitous nature of fires and therefore smoke in the lives of the earliest lox makers.

Step #3: Cold Smoking (4 hours)

Cold smoking is a method of smoking meat, fish, cheese, what have you, without actually cooking it with heat. It is done with temperatures under 90F/32C, which allows the fish to remain “uncooked” while picking up the complex flavors that smoking imparts upon food. There are many many ways to cold smoke, but most require you to be outside and are similar to a grill set up. I have two methods that I use to smoke salmon. My first choice is to use an outdoor cold smoking set up, where I use an A-maze-N tube smoker in a Weber grill, carefully monitoring the temperature level to make sure it never rises too high.

If I don’t have easy access to one, I use a jerry-rigged indoor set up, using a Smoking Gun attached to tubing that sends the smoke into a Styrofoam cooler.

Before cold smoking the lox, I add simple spices to the cured lox: fresh dill and both black and white peppercorns. Using my cold smoking set up, I cold smoke the salmon for 4 hours. After this time, I set the salmon on a rack in the fridge and allow it to rest overnight.

The next morning, the salmon is cured, smoked, and ready to enjoy!

Slice it thin and enjoy!

It is great on homemade bread, matzah, bagels, or even just by itself!

Lamb Prosciutto

June 9, 2014 by AOG Leave a Comment

This post is on the making of lamb prosciutto, or prosciutto d’agnello. The term prosciutto usually refers to the cured leg of an animal, whether it be pork or goat or lamb or what have you. Regardless of what you want to call it, it’s delicious, and is a fun project for anyone who is interested in meat curing.

Lamb is one of those meats that its often said you either like or you don’t. I lived my whole life disliking the flavor of lamb, until after a meal at an Indian restaurant it suddenly clicked and I fell in love with it. I think it has a lot to do with the way the lamb is prepared,so my advice to all who say they just “don’t like the flavor of lamb” is to keep trying it prepared in different ways. You’ll never know which one clicks with you.

After experimenting with different style bresaola, we decided it was time to move on to a different type of meat. Which better meat to try than lamb? Lamb prosciutto was one we had tried in restaurants before, and even though I hadn’t loved it, I thought there could be room for experimentation and improvement which turned out to be 100% correct.

The process started with a boneless lamb leg roast purchased from a local grocery store. Although it was actually butchered pretty cleanly, we separated the meat into two pieces to avoid creating troublesome air pockets within the meat and to let it dry faster, since I’m not the most patient of all meat curers.

Curing (3 weeks):

By this time, I’d gotten so familiar with the usual ratios of spices that I did a good amount of ad libbing with the cure. I added some spices that are usually paired with lamb to complement the meat. The basic ratios that I used are in the following chart:

*I have since changed the ratios I use for salt and cure #2. See my most recent posts for the most up to date ratios that I use.

The lamb was mixed with the spices, massaged, and vacuum sealed. It was put in the refrigerator for 3 weeks to cure.

After 3 weeks, the cure was washed away from the lamb using cold water and lamb was dried off. We packaged it usually the available casings that we had, 100 mm collagen casings. After using beef bung, I would probably prefer this method in the future, but collagen was what we had so collagen is what we used. The two pieces of lamb were oddly shaped, and so my barely adequate butcher string technique led to some interesting looking hanging lamb, but hey if it hangs it hangs right?

Fermentation (48 hours):

Temperature: 69F/20C

Humidity: 80-90% RH

*I have since stopped doing a fermentation stage in my whole muscle cures. See my more recent posts for information on this.

There is some debate on the usefulness of a fermentation stage in whole muscle meat curing. We left the lamb hanging in the curing chamber for 48 hours during this stage, after spraying the meat with a 0.5% solution of Penicillium nalgiovense to induce beneficial mold growth.

Ideally at the end of the fermentation stage, you would see a decrease in pH to less than 5.1, letting you know the meat was becoming acidic due to beneficial bacterial activity. Since I don’t currently have a pH meter, and pH strips are moderately useful at best, I’ve gone forward after 48 hours regardless. This drop in pH is much more necessary to check in ground meat salami preparations such as sausage making.

Drying (6-8 weeks):

Temperature: 54F/12C

Humidity: 70% RH

The waiting is the hardest part. At this point, all you can do is wait and monitor weight loss. Keep a careful eye on the temperature and humidity, and when weight loss reaches 30% you are ready! Some may like more weight loss, some may like less, but I’ve settled on 30%. At a weight loss of 30% your meat is definitely not the same meat you put into the curing chamber, but it’s still moist and delicious and when sliced thin is heavenly.

This lamb took somewhere between 6-8 weeks to be ready, the smaller one was ready sooner. This slightly longer time was probably due to the fact that our humidity was on the higher side, but I prefer it that way. Higher humidity means it will take longer for your meat to dry out, and you might need to combat some enemy molds, but you won’t have case hardening or end up with jerky like meat instead of the succulent treasure that is slowly cured and dried charcuterie.

Slice it up and pair it with cheese and other fermented treats and enjoy!