Techniques Pancetta/Guanciale

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We shouldn't tell everyone. Once more people discover how nice PX is it'll stop being so surprisingly cheap.
 
update; meat cure salt (0.6%) and pure KNO3 are in, meat curing bags, vacuum bags and a vacuum machine are ordered...the big wait is for a response from the Mangalica farmer.
 
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no response yet so I bought some Livar belly, at Hanos...pretty expensive IMO (15e/kg) for a wholesale chain
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and the vacuum machine arrived...4 or so weeks from now we know more :)
 
Because nitrite consumption is associated with a significantly increased risk of colon cancer. It's one of the things that consistently pops up in the data, and why 'processed meats' are pretty widely considered as unhealthy at this point.

That being said, botulism is not something to joke with. It is possible to make cured meats without nitrites (parma ham for example) but my guess is this requires having really good control of your process. Not something I'd screw around with without doing significant research first.

If I were to go down this adventure I'd also consider making coppa. Quite different from guanciale, but just like guanciale a lot more interesting than pancetta. I tend to always use guanciale & coppa in a 50/50 mix to get the best of both worlds.
Nitrite can be found in celery and can be used as a substitute in the curing process - Google is your friend here.
 
Hybrid approach, coloroso salt, brine for 2 weeks in the fridge in a regular vacuum bag, then smoke (or not TBD) and change into a dry aging bag.

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Nitrite can be found in celery and can be used as a substitute in the curing process - Google is your friend here.
Indeed. The nitrite in the celery is exactly the same nitrite that is in cure #1.
 
Indeed. The nitrite in the celery is exactly the same nitrite that is in cure #1.
wouldn't you need a huge amount of nitrate, making the taste of celery quite overpowering?
I mean 1 g nitrate (let's stick to the nomenclature) per 1000g celery, if I was to preserve 1 kg of pancetta using celery I'd need 35g at 0.6% nitrate makes 0.21g pure nitrate, equalling 210g celery.

In the end it's still nitrate, regardless of the source..
 
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wouldn't you need a huge amount of nitrate, making the taste of celery quite overpowering?
When people use celery as the cure, they use celery juice powder, which contains both nitrite and nitrate and is more concentrated than just ground celery. And, yes, it can affect the flavour, so the end product can have some of that celery taste in it (as well as getting a greenish hue).

Nitrite is nitrite, and nitrate is nitrate, regardless of whether it is added as a salt or as part of celery juice powder. The "no added nitrite" for meat products cured with celery is a marketing con and probably should be banned.

BTW, I was surprised to see that you are using KNO₃ (saltpeter) for your sausages. Use of saltpeter in sausage making went out of fashion quite a few decades ago. When nitrate is called for, people almost exclusively use sodium nitrate (NaNO₃) instead.

Also, nitrate is normally used only for meat products that require more than 30 days of ripening (salami, large salumi, and similar). For anything that ripens for less (such as smoked sausages and the like), nitrite is the better option because it readily breaks down into nitric oxide (which is what inhibits bacteria growth).

Potassium nitrate in meat (more so than sodium nitrate) readily forms nitrosamines when heated. Nitrosamines are carcinogenic, which is why bacon (which is most often fried) is not allowed to have any nitrate added to it in the US.

This is a good article about celery juice powder: Processing Meats with Celery Powder
 
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I was surprised to see that nitrate (next to nitrite) was used with the commercial guanciale above.

Btw, I always cold smoke at the end. Never gave that any thought. Smoking is addictive, I cannot do without anymore ;)
 
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I was surprised to see that nitrate (next to nitrite) was used with the commercial guanciale above.
Not a problem. If you let it ripen long enough, the nitrate converts to nitrite and then into nitrous oxide. 30 days of ripening is generally quoted as the minimum to get the nitrate to drop to a safe level.
Btw, I always cold smoke at the end. Never gave that any thought. Smoking is addictive, I cannot do without anymore ;)
Traditionally, guanciale is unsmoked. But I don't see why you couldn't smoke it. It'll come out a lot like many German speck versions that way, certainly very delicious!
 
Not a problem. If you let it ripen long enough, the nitrate converts to nitrite and then into nitrous oxide. 30 days of ripening is generally quoted as the minimum to get the nitrate to drop to a safe level.
Yeah, I doubt it was aged for at least a month. I hang them for about 3 weeks and I felt that was longer. Mind you, the commercial one was with skin on.

Traditionally, guanciale is unsmoked. But I don't see why you couldn't smoke it. It'll come out a lot like many German speck versions that way, certainly very delicious!
I should have put emphasis in the first sentence ;) I always smoke after drying, not before. Also imagine the fridge would get a delicious smoking smell.
Yeah, smoked guanciale is basically a kick ass pancetta affumicata. I've encountered it in Italy on rare occasions.

Curious what made @MarcelNL decide to use a dry aging bag.
 
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Yeah, I doubt it was aged for at least a month. I hang them for about 3 weeks and I felt that was longer. Mind you, the commercial one was with skin on.


I should have put emphasis in the first sentence ;) I always smoke after drying, not before. Also imagine the fridge would get a delicious smoking smell.
Yeah, smoked guanciale is basically a kick ass pancetta affumicata. I've encountered it in Italy on rare occasions.

Curious what made @MarcelNL decide to use a dry aging bag.
basically the lack of a cool environment with correct humidity (no garage but a wooden shed that gets damp and blistering hot in summer) and this;

https://osfa.nl/recepten/overig/ove...ta-dry-aged-ontbijtspek-met-drya-dry-age-zak/
@Michi, I'm not making any sausage, I just picked up some KNO3 for old time sake and 'demonstrational purposes' to introduce a very inquisitive 6 year old to the wonders of the world of chemistry.

I plan to inch my way forward in this...as I'm quite wary of food poisoning and all that.

Pancetta is step 1, that'll take a good month as you mention, next up is Mangalica Guanciale but I guess I'll have to bribe that farmer first to get some cheek, perhaps sausages after that....we're probably three months out by then.

The dry age bags should (I hope) work well to control humidity for anything that needs air drying but we'll see...I'll learn more as I go along and hope to stay on the safe side of food poisoning.
 
Ah clear. I thought you were making/converting a dedicated fridge for charcuterie ;)

Edit:
Cured Meats is also a nice recipe source
 
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@Michi, I'm not making any sausage, I just picked up some KNO3 for old time sake and 'demonstrational purposes' to introduce a very inquisitive 6 year old to the wonders of the world of chemistry.
That's one lucky 6-year old :) I hope you do impart the amount of respect that is required. Potassium nitrate is no joke.
I plan to inch my way forward in this...as I'm quite wary of food poisoning and all that.

Pancetta is step 1, that'll take a good month as you mention, next up is Mangalica Guanciale but I guess I'll have to bribe that farmer first to get some cheek, perhaps sausages after that....we're probably three months out by then.
For most sausages, you don't need any nitrite or nitrate at all. Anything that is cooked within a few hours or so of making it, or frozen shortly after making it, no need for nitrite. The nitrite thing comes in only if the product spends an extended amount of time (hours or more) in the danger zone (3 ºC to about 60 ºC), and if conditions are anaerobic. Then nitrite is called for. Nitrate is needed only for things that spend more than 30 days in the danger zone, such as salami.

Once you try to cure meats, I'd recommend to stick with cure #1 and cure #2. Tried and true, and pretty much fool-proof unless you mess up with the measurements. (German Nitritpökelsalz is a bit safer because, at 0.65% nitrite concentration, it's practically impossible to OD on nitrite, whereas with cure #1, you can OD.)
The dry age bags should (I hope) work well to control humidity for anything that needs air drying but we'll see...I'll learn more as I go along and hope to stay on the safe side of food poisoning.
I don't have a dedicated drying chamber and ripen things in a normal fridge. Humidity in there is too low (around 65%) for normal ripening to work; I'd end up with bad case hardening all the time. I've had good success with the dry age steak wraps from The Sausage Maker, as well as with UMAi bags. It's not as perfect as doing things in a dedicated drying chamber at 80% humidity, but the results are good enough. It means that I can make cured and dried hams and salami without having a dedicated fridge that is good only for charcuterie.

For information on all things charcuterie, the best English YouTube channel (by far) is Two Guys And A Cooler. Eric is extremely knowledgable, a good teacher, and his recipes are genuine.

As a general source for recipes and information about charcuterie, Marianski's meatsandsausages.com is a really good resource. Not all recipes are "right" (in the sense of being completely authentic), but you can learn a lot there about the process, the chemistry, the safety aspects, technique, and a whole lot of other things.
 
Ah clear. I thought you were making/converting a dedicated fridge for charcuterie ;)

Edit:
Cured Meats is also a nice recipe source
I toyed with the idea, perhaps at a later stage when I have a better 'feel' for the product....That fridge would have to sit in the shed, and I expect it will not be able to control temperature in our 'modern' summers. plan on using the wine fridge for the dry aging part , that for sure will not work in summer, a Peltier element can only cool x degrees and is quite slow too but for now it should work.

@Michi, thanks for the warning, I'm well aware of Potassium Nitrate as chemical engineer (we made a.o. nitroglycerine in the lab)

Plan on experimenting with one batch of the pancetta with a small 'smoking gun' I got ....nowhere near 16 hours, probably more like 5 minutes or 10...still it worked well on the slices of beet I smoked and that sort of gadgetty frills.
 
midstage(?) report, the meat is drying but VERY slowly....I'm beginning to think I may need to end the process here, re-vacuum or do whatever....the fact I left te skin on may contribute to the slow process(?)

the smaller piece still has 40g of weight to lose for over a week now, short of any dietary measures I cannot think of anything to do but wait longer, or re-vacuum

2 weeks of curing, now 7 weeks in the weight loss program...I think I'll give it another 2 weeks.
 
midstage(?) report, the meat is drying but VERY slowly....
Nothing to worry about. It can take eight or nine weeks, or even more. It depends on the size of the meat and the temperature and relative humidity. The capocollo and (small diameter) salami I made recently took seven weeks, and I could have let them go for quite some time beyond that. What weight loss are you shooting for? (Not that it matters. Anything between 30% and 45% or more is normal—it's just a matter of personal preference.)

If there is anything wrong with the meat, you will know. Obvious mould growth, or slimy bacteria growing on the surface, bad smell, major discolouration, etc. Your nose will tell you, as will a center cut once you think it's ready. If there is anything unpleasant inside, just don't eat it.

If you have cured your meat with the correct cure and correct amount, it pretty much cannot "go off". When you think about it, parma ham spends a year and a half just hanging out, and they don't even use curing salts for that, just plain salt.

Just be patient. It's an essential virtue with charcuterie :)
 
thanks for that dose of reality Michi!

I am aiming for 30% weight loss, and was a bit puzzled by an apparent plateau of the weight reading most folks need like 3 weeks tops.

The meat looks great, smells great and there is no mold or other signs of anything going in the wrong direction.

patience...hmmm let me see where I left that prescription...
 
If you weigh your meat every few days, you'll notice that, initially, weight loss is quite rapid, and then progressively slows down. I think this is because the meat dries from the outside in, so the moisture in the center has a harder time escaping: the osmotic pressure differential gets smaller as the meat gets drier.

If it looks good and smells good, chances are that it is good :)
 
My 2 (inexperienced cents):
-All guanciale I had always had the skin still on, so I don't see any particular problem with this.
-There is such a thing as 'losing too much moisture'. Actualy had this happen with (storebought) blocks that lingered too long in the fridge; they just get harder and dryer without the flavor really getting particularly better from it. Also makes it a lot more annoying to process.
-I have no idea what's a normal number of weight loss for any particular cut, but guanciale is very high in fat so I'd expect the number to be different than other cuts.
-At some point if it had enough time I'd just have a taste and actually try. In the end the flavor is more important than what the scale says.
 
Guanciale is usually quite dry, probably around 35-40% weight loss. As you say, it's a matter of personal preference. It will be nice regardless of whether it's still quite soft, or more dry like jerky.

What does make for good guanciale IMO is that the fat is quite firm, and remains quite firm even after frying. Not at all like normal bacon belly fat, which ends up very soft after frying. I think that letting guanciale dry for longer does help to achieve that texture. But it also is the cut of meat: pork cheek fat is quite different from belly fat or back fat.

But, really, no matter what you do, home-made guanciale is likely to be better than almost anything you can buy in a shop, and for a fraction of the price.

Case in point: I bought a kilogram of bacon the other day. Sold as "cooking bacon", meaning that it's a bag full of irregular-shaped pieces. Which is fine if all I want is a few bits of chopped bacon in a dish. I don't need premium display quality rashers for that.

I paid $8 for my kilogram of bacon, and I got exactly what I paid for it. A mildly salty and mostly flavourless concoction, with high water content (evident during frying because of all the sputtering and steaming), and with fat that was flabby, soft, and unappealing. Not properly cured, not properly flavoured.

I can sort of understand why manufacturers inject water into the product. It's a lot cheaper to sell me water than it is to sell me bacon. But there really is no excuse for the lack of flavour and the poor curing. Doing it properly costs nothing. To make bad bacon, I really have to go out of my way, because bacon will taste good pretty much no matter what I do to it. But, somehow, manufacturers manage to make bad bacon anyway :(
 
To me the main perk of using guanciale (and coppa) versus bacon is that I'm actually getting far more and far more interesting flavor than your usual run of the mill bacon that tends to just be... very high on salt but low on actual flavor.
What's generally sold as bacon here tends to just be pumped up trash with more water than taste. And very little of it ever saw any actual curing.
 
for clarity; I'm doing pancetta here, I haven't been able to source unfrozen Mangalica cheek (yet...)

the quality of store bought pancetta is what drove me to to do this, and the opportunity is to aim for Mangalica guanciale and pancetta. I may give guanciale made from frozen cheek a go when I cannot find anything else soon. Bacon, I don't even go there in the Netherlands...salt water pork
 
@Michi,

yep, weight loss will be declining over time, that I understand and have witnessed...logical as the outer diameter will shrink. Currently weight loss appears to plateau, I did not keep an excel sheet with the numbers or I could have checked if it's still a curve, it may just feel as if it had flatlined..

patience was the cure ;-)
 
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