Mosefund Mangalitsa 'Nduja results

Here is the result of my previous 'nduja post. Honestly, I don't think I'm capable of producing 'nduja any better than this. I think this one looks awesome and tastes great. The texture is perfectly smooth and spreadable. The really light amount of smoke is just enough to come through. The hog middle end caps really made a difference as far as the appearance of authenticity. The 'nduja pictured aged for roughly 90 days, but, was perfectly fine at 60 days. Should have a new batch going in soon. Short post, I know, but, I HAD to show this one off. If you haven't yet made 'nduja and are thinking about it, don't forget you can get all your supplies at my store.

Fiocco/Fiochetto- byproduct of Culatello butchery

Fiocco or fiochetto, whatever you choose to call it, it is delicious. This salume was the byproduct of my culatello process back in January. Due to it being only 1/3 the size of the culatello and noticeably leaner, it dries much more quickly. This was really a no brainer. 3.5% salt, .25% cure #2, that's it. Cured it for about 14 days. Then stuffed it in a hog bladder, trussed it, tied it, hung it and forgot it, just as you see in the first pic. 52 degrees and 70-75% humidity and 4 months later.........voila! Fiocco! Not really much more to say about this. If you're going to butcher a culatello, might as well harvest this and make it as well. I've already eaten quite a few sandwiches using this. It is quite lean and subtle, yet still really moist and "hammy."

Salsiccia di Calabria....."My Calabria" style

After my initial post on this, I conferred several times with my friend Rosetta, who is the author of the outstanding book, "My Calabria." I was fortunate enough to try some of her father's Salsiccia di Calabria. Rosetta informed me the recipe is exactly that of the fresh sausage recipe from the book. Easy enough, I figured. However, the recipe doesn't call for a starter or any nitrate. But, that's no big deal at all, really.

This time around it was just some pork shoulder with the addition of some mangalitsa fat from Mosefund, only 10% of the total weight. Salt, hot pepper powder, sweet pepper powder, and some fennel seeds, along with some cure #2 and f-lc starter.......that's it. I stuffed these in regular hog casings. Fermented for close to 80 hours. They were hung to dry at 52 degrees and about 79% humidity. I'm not quite sure what's been going on in my chamber recently, but, my salumi have been taking an inordinate amount of time to dry, my salame, in particular. Typically, salame I make stuffed in regular hog casings can be done in as little as 3 weeks. For some reason, this wasn't ready for a whopping 8 weeks! I speculate that it could be the lack of moisture in the mangalitsa fat, but, at only 10% of it's total mass, that seems unlikely. When I introduced that lot of 30lbs. of 'nduja, the humidity jumped to over 80% and averaged about 82% for a couple weeks, but, that still shouldn't delay drying to that degree. So, I'm at a loss for an explanation.

Regardless, the flavor seems unaffected by the chamber's issues. It is very tasty. Perfectly balanced to where everything can be tasted and no component overwhelms. I did vary the recipe slightly. I only used half the sweet pepper powder the recipe called for and replaced the other half with hot pepper powder. The rest of the recipe was followed closely. As you can see by the picture, the powders turned the fat orange. Good stuff. I suggest buying this amazing book and giving this one a try.

'Nduja quickie

Won't bore anyone with details of a salume about which I've posted several times already. What sets this particular batch apart from the others is #1, I used hog middle end caps to case them, and #2, I used some sweet pepper powder or pepe rosso in addition to peperoncino powder. The hog middle caps are significant in that along with hog middles, they are what are used to case 'nduja in Calabria. The sweet pepper powder/pepe rosso was used this time as a means of correcting the color I've had in prior batches. My previous efforts have been a touch too dark. After several discussions with Rosetta, author of "My Calabria" she suggested I use the pepe rosso to get that fantastic, glowing red color. I decided on using 17% peperoncino powder, along with 13% of the pepe rosso. I think Rosetta had it right, and I think I nailed it, just look at the color. I decided to avoid prolonged smoking this time in an effort to preserve this great color. Whether or not that had anything to do with it's color is not definitive, but, why take a chance. So, just 2 days smoking. However, I lit the smoker from both ends to increase the intensity of the smoke and cut down on actual smoking time, 2 sessions of 8 hours each and they smelled much smokier than in the past at the same smoke hour. Usually, I ferment for about 48-72 hours, then smoke. But, I had a couple days in the northeast where it was about 60-65 during the day, so, I smoked during the fermentation phase, and I believe it was pretty successful. Hung to dry for about 60 days. Other than that, nothing else special to discuss. Just eager to see how this one turns out.

Salame di Mugnano

This salame comes from the town of Mugnano which is right outside of Naples in Campania. Jason did a post on it in January, so, I won't get too in depth. Which leads to my next point. This salame was a collaboration of sorts. As Jason was describing it, I became intrigued.................hot pepper, cold smoke, I'm in. So, we devised a recipe to follow to see how the same salame prepared by two different people would differ in appearance and flavor. There were several differences in our recipes. As usual, I went overboard on peperoncino powder AND black pepper. I actually used twice the amount that Jason used. My black pepper content was 1.5%, while I think Jason's was somewhere near .4%, so WAYYY more. The other difference was the fat component. I used fatback versus pork belly for Jason. Everything else used was the same, although I'm pretty positive my salt % is higher. I used F-LC starter along with .5% dextrose. I stuffed this into hog middles, which is a new casing for me, just recently acquired. These hog middles look great, very authentic, they also dry perfectly and evenly, a delight to use. Although, their diameter is slightly larger and they take quite a bit longer to dry. I fermented for about 80 hours at 70 degrees. They were then cold smoked for 12 hours. This was a difficult salame for me to try and reproduce. I had no point of reference as I've never eaten it before, all I had to go on was Jason's description of it. With that, I certainly didn't want to oversmoke it, so, I only went with one smoke session. I then hung them in my chamber at 53 degrees and 78% humidity. A seemingly endless 11 weeks later, it was pulled down and sliced. The result is what you see above, looks awesome......I think, anyway. It tastes as amazing as it looks. It is rather spicy, which is right up my alley as you may have read here prior. Still, what's amazing about this peperoncino powder is that it provides not only heat, but a wonderful pepper flavor and seldom overwhelms as the meat flavor is totally apparent. I can't speak on it's authenticity, again, I've never eaten it, but, I CAN say it's great, nevertheless and certainly worth making. I may make this my default salame. Thanks to Angelo again for taking the lovely photo.

Speck results

4 long months of waiting is finally over. This is the smaller of my 2 speck projects. As you may be able to tell from the picture, that is certainly not a photo I took. Thanks to Angelo, not for just the picture, but for slicing and the actual harvesting of the cut. There isn't much to add from my initial post about this item in December. They dried for nearly 4 months in my chamber. I had to remove them on several occasions to be wiped down with a vinegar solution based on the mold build up. However, after about their fifth washdown, I noticed that the mold was all white and wasn't returning with any fervency. So, I decided I would just let it go and see what happened, while keeping a close eye on it. Strangely enough, the mold returned, grew a bit and then kind of faded. Lucky, I guess. I pulled it down out of curiosity last week and noticed it was rather hard in spots, and made the decision to cut into it. Great decision. It is fantastic. Keep in mind, this was done with just regular commercial pork. As this was my first attempt, I make it a rule to never use heritage or super top quality pork for practice. I can't imagine having to throw out a $200 piece of pork. It looks perfect, quite reminiscent of the speck I ate in Sudtirol. Smoke is near perfect as well. Very moist still on the thicker inside slices. Just delicious. I'm not alone in that regard, I brought this over Angelo's house the other night and after everyone got their greedy little hands on it, I am left with what you're looking at in the picture. Good thing I have big speck lurking in the chamber. This is one of my favorite things I have made to date.

Bresaolina di Cervo Affumicata

I gave everyone a break by posting about Lardo from Tuscany. I'm going back the Sudtirol well with this. Bresaolina di cervo is a small bresaola made from venison meat. This is one of the salumi I actually ate at a restaurant called Tubladel in Ortisei. It was soooooo good, I had to reproduce it, or at least try. What stood out to me while eating it was the pungency of the smoke. Quite obviously achieved with the use of juniper wood. I asked the server how it was made. He returned after a brief consultation with the chef(I guess to get permission) and told me it varied from producer to producer as to what was used, but, rattled off a bunch of things that ARE actually used, like rosemary, sage, marjoram, caraway, bay, nutmeg, juniper and anise were those I remember. Then he told me it is cold smoked for several hours a day over the course of the week with juniper wood..........of course. At least I now had a good point of reference. The first time I was to attempt it, the venison wasn't butchered quite well enough for me, so it became the Kaminwurzen, about which I posted previously. In the meantime, Jason and I discussed what he should do with his nice cylindrical piece of venison. So, he went ahead and stole my idea. ;) I'm glad he did, his looks amazing. However, he did not smoke his.

Finally, my cousin showed up on New Year's day with 4 good looking "roasts," which are ubiquitous with venison hunters/butchers. I'm beginning to learn the "roast" is the entire deer anatomy outside the "backstrap" in that world. So, I really don't have much of an idea what part of the animal it is. Gun to my head, I'll say it's from the leg. When I got them defrosted, all 4 small pieces were suitable for my application. I went ahead and cured them with salt, black pepper, caraway, bay and cure #2. They only took a little over a week to cure. I rinsed them and stuffed them in beef bungs. For the smoke component, I tried something different. I've been using the pro-q cold smoker for quite a long time. Recently, I bought a new cold smoke generator called the a-maze-n smoker. I was perfectly happy with the pro-q, but, I kept getting in trouble with wifey because there was candle wax everywhere from the tea light used to light the pro-q. I'd also received an earful for dipping into her tea light supply. Jason just informed me about this new device the day before, and when I saw that the a-maze-n came with a mini torch with which to light it, I impetuously bought it. No more wax trouble. In a nutshell, this is the cold smoke generator I used to smoke the bresaolline. I used a mixed harwood sawdust along with some crushed juniper berries which I added to the sawdust. (side note: I think I finally found some juniper sawdust). What's different about the new smoke generator as opposed to the pro-q is that it can be lit from both ends, producing twice the smoke. Having cold smoked several salumi with the pro-q, I can state that the smoke flavor is very subtle, barely noticeable. Which is nice, especially for 'nduja. However, the smoke flavor I tasted in Sudtirol is much more aggressive, yet, still not overwhelming. Still......very smokey. That was my intention. So, I lit both ends. It smoked, a LOT. That reduced my smoking time from 12-14 hours down to about 8 hours per day. My notes say I put 40-45 hours of smoke on these, about 4 days. They were then hung in my chamber. Keep close watch, they're so lean, they only hung for about a month. I put them in on February 2 and pulled them out on March 3. As you can tell from the pictures, they look terrific. As for the taste, I could tell the minute I opened them that I hit it out of the park. I could smell that same pungent smoke I have been after. A couple of thin slices confirmed it. It was exactly the smoke flavor I remember tasting at Tubladel. Still apparent were both the bay and caraway, so I think I nailed it. Even have that really nice smoke ring on the outside as well. If you have venison in the freezer and don't what to do with it, wonder no more!