Garth's Small Goodies - Part 1: Pancetta and Lonza

SAUSAGES,CHARCUTERIE and DELI ARTS
GarthFader
Posts: 124
Joined: Mon Feb 03, 2014 4:38 pm

Re: Garth's Small Goodies - Part 1: Pancetta and Lonza

Post by GarthFader »

I'm enjoying the curing side more than the BBQ side at the moment, finding the time to fire up the offset for a long cook is a bit of a struggle at the moment, these projects are a great set and forget deal.

Still, i'm mixing it up and starting some cider brined, maple glazed, hot smoked bacon with some rolled loin next week. But i've taken a day off work stay home, drink beer, play xbox and tend to a fire.
GarthFader
Posts: 124
Joined: Mon Feb 03, 2014 4:38 pm

Re: Garth's Small Goodies - Part 1: Pancetta and Lonza

Post by GarthFader »

Return of the Pancetta!

So the last batch I made was just a straight up salt cure, this time i'm using a different cure for the 1.5kg belly piece i'm using... This time i'm also using cure #2, the stress of giving people 6 week old pork that was cured in salt only was too much for me, I was convinced everyone was going to get botulism!

Ingredients
1.5kg belly (boneless, skin-on)
7g peppercorns
7g juniper berries
2 garlic cloves minced
2 bay leaves
2 rosemary sprigs
45g salt (3% of meat weight)
7g Cure #2

Method
1. Toast peppercorns then crush in mortar and pestle.
2. finely chop rosemary
3. Smoosh the juniper berries, garlic, rosemary and bay leaves in with the pepper
4. Stir the mushed up bits through the salt and rub it all over the belly (both sides)
5. Sprinkle the Cure#2 evenly over the non-skin side (I didn't put it on the skin side as it's less likely to penetrate, so more likely to be wasted and result in a less safe product)
6. Seal the meat along with all the cure in a vac-seal bag (if you don't have a vac-sealer just use a heavy zip lock bag and squeeze out as much air as possible)
7. Put it in the fridge for 1 day per kg or part thereof (i'll keep this on in for 2 days). Flip the meat at least once during this time

Once the meat has been in the cure for the appropriate amount of time, remove it from the bag/container and rinse well to remove all the cure, you can use cold water, but I prefer to use a white wine (why use something with no flavour when you can use booze!).

After you've rinsed the meat well, weigh each piece and record the weight on a piece of tape. If you have some meat hooks, piece the skin in two corners and hang using the hooks in a drying chamber (I use a fridge with a thermostat override set to 14ºC +/- 2ºC, and humidity of ~70%). Stick the tape with the starting weight of the meat onto the hook.

You'll know when the Pancetta is ready by the weight, it needs to dry long enough to lose 30% of it's starting weight (my target for this piece is 1kg). The last time I did a batch the pieces were about 1kg each to begin with and they took only 2 weeks.

Here are a couple of pics prior to going into the fridge... i'll post more when the cure period is done.

Cure all rubbed in...
Image

Vac-sealed and ready for the fridge
Image

I've read in a couple of online recipes/guide for pancetta and dry-cured bacon that say you should drain the juices away daily, but the book i'm following says not to, as the liquid drawn out of the meat mixes with the salt and creates a brine of sorts... This mixture then penetrates the meat and seeps back out repeatedly as the salt level in the meat tries to equalise with the salt level outside... This repeated passing of the brine back and forth takes flavour in and liquid out each time, and softens the cells of the meat. As they soften they expand and can hold more moisture.

My understanding of this is that the 'dry-cure' isn't supposed to dry out the meat, that's done when the meat is hung later... The dry-cure is intended to tenderise and for want of a better word 'flavourise' the meat by dragging the cure (and flavours) in and out of the cells.

I can only assume the recipes that suggested draining the liquid were planning on using them as is without a drying period afterwards, so by draining the liquid you were essentially drying the meat out... but you'd also be taking out the salt, so I don't see the point.
Smokey
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Re: Garth's Small Goodies - Part 1: Pancetta and Lonza

Post by Smokey »

Great work, Both ways are acceptable but you are using nitrate, It needs to be kept in.
Draining is more to do with using heaps of salt and no Nitrits or rates. Blood is the bad man and your cure has that in check.
I reckon this batch will be brilliant. You have done everything right
If trees screamed when we cut them down, We wouldn't. If they screamed all the time we would.
http://www.aussiecue.com.au
gnol
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Joined: Sun Jan 22, 2012 1:33 pm
Location: Werribee

Re: Garth's Small Goodies - Part 1: Pancetta and Lonza

Post by gnol »

Great stuff GarthFader. I'm too chicken to play around with the air cured stuff so stick to the brines for now. Got all the gear I need from homebrewing but still have not attempted it.
I've been meaning too get that book as well. I have Charcuterie: The Craft of Salting, Smoking, and Curing by the same author and it is a great book.
GarthFader
Posts: 124
Joined: Mon Feb 03, 2014 4:38 pm

Re: Garth's Small Goodies - Part 1: Pancetta and Lonza

Post by GarthFader »

Great work, Both ways are acceptable but you are using nitrate, It needs to be kept in.
Draining is more to do with using heaps of salt and no Nitrits or rates. Blood is the bad man and your cure has that in check.
I reckon this batch will be brilliant. You have done everything right
Thanks smokey,

The last batch I did was just salt, no nitrates/nitrites, with the same salt ratio (3% of meat weight)... I used the same vac-sealed method as seen here, and the result was good, and nobody got sick :wink:

The cure#2 is just for my peace of mind.
Great stuff GarthFader. I'm too chicken to play around with the air cured stuff so stick to the brines for now. Got all the gear I need from homebrewing but still have not attempted it.
I've been meaning too get that book as well. I have Charcuterie: The Craft of Salting, Smoking, and Curing by the same author and it is a great book.
Just give it a go! One of the best things about it is that there is not much 'hands-on' time... Unlike BBQ you spend half an hour prepping, then chuck it in the fridge, it's a great way to have delicious home-made products without investing too much time. (unless you count waiting).
GarthFader
Posts: 124
Joined: Mon Feb 03, 2014 4:38 pm

Re: Garth's Small Goodies - Part 1: Pancetta and Lonza

Post by GarthFader »

Quick update on the latest batch!

So after about 52 hours vac-sealed in the salt cure you can see the moisture that has seeped out of the meat the colour has become much pinker too.

Image
Image

Then hanging up in the drying fridge, i'll leave it at 4ºCfor 24 hours, then set it to 15ºC for the rest of the drying period. You can see the cheap little desktop fan on the top shelf used to keep the air moving, it runs constantly but not pointed at the meat. This should take about 3 weeks to dry and reduce to the target weight of
1kg... Then it's slicing time!

Image
punkin
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Location: Tamworth, NSW Australia
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Re: Garth's Small Goodies - Part 1: Pancetta and Lonza

Post by punkin »

Great thread and one of my favourite hobbies. Some questionable recommendations re cures though.

For these air cured products you should be using cure #2(remembering there are different strength cures under different brand names but #2 is 6% odd nitrate content) at .25% not measuring via the teaspoon. If there is a chance of making someone sick or killing them and you can prevent that with the use of the proper cure, then who in their right mind would not use it? I know you can get away nearly all the time without it but why would you if you have the choice?

Also your brine/dry cure times should not be measured at days/kilo if you are using a good practice like 3% salt by weight. The whole idea of using salt by weight is that you can cure for as long as you like and the cure will never get too salty rather than use the dredge method.

2 days for a 2 kilo belly is not much time and doesn't allow for the cure to be drawn into the middle of the meat via osmosis. The same time for a 2kg shoulder or loin fillet will obviously allow much less penetration on a thicker muscle.

Some great advice, top recipes and good practices here;

http://curedmeats.blogspot.com.au/

This guy is the most switched on of all the internet stuff i found and i did some heavy research after buying the Charcuterie book.

Happy to link to threads on other forums about my new hobby but i don't have photobucket to post pics if the forum here doesn't allow for uploads.

Leave the cure in the vac bags for 7-10 days for a belly and up to a couple weeks or longer for larger pieces.
www.stilldragon.com.au for all your distilling needs in Australia, New Zealand or Asia.
punkin
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Joined: Sun May 08, 2016 10:37 am
Location: Tamworth, NSW Australia
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Re: Garth's Small Goodies - Part 1: Pancetta and Lonza

Post by punkin »

I opened a rolled pancetta yesterday i did from a heritage Large Black sow that a mate grew and we turned the whole thing into chacuterie last October. It was cured for 10 days and rolled and cased then lightly cold smoked and cured in the garage for a month or two and after the garage got too hot it was placed in my fermneter fridge at 19C until yesterday.

I'm trying to upload a photo and thought i'd got under the Mb limit by shrinking it down to 450 pixels but now it says 'Sorry, the board attachment quota has been reached'. Does anyone know a way around this that doesn't involve linking to a photo hosting site?

Is it permissible to link to other sites where i have the photo's uploaded in Chacuterie threads?
www.stilldragon.com.au for all your distilling needs in Australia, New Zealand or Asia.
titch
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Joined: Sun Oct 10, 2010 12:51 pm
Location: Sth East Melbourne

Re: Garth's Small Goodies - Part 1: Pancetta and Lonza

Post by titch »

Does anyone know a way around this that doesn't involve linking to a photo hosting site?

No

Is it permissible to link to other sites where i have the photo's uploaded in Chacuterie threads?

Not my call, but seeing as this site is not overly active,do it,may encourage others to join in
Cheers
Titch
punkin
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Joined: Sun May 08, 2016 10:37 am
Location: Tamworth, NSW Australia
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Re: Garth's Small Goodies - Part 1: Pancetta and Lonza

Post by punkin »

www.stilldragon.com.au for all your distilling needs in Australia, New Zealand or Asia.
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