Reddit reviews Salumi: The Craft of Italian Dry Curing

Bacon is the easiest place to start, since it doesn't involve as much work or special equipment as sausages — you just add a curing salt mix to a pork belly, stick it in the fridge for 7 - 10 days, flipping it daily to redistribute the cure. Of course there are a few variations on this, and you can smoke it at the end, but that's the gist of it. Recipes are easy to find online.

If you really want to get into fermented sausages, you're looking at a much more involved undertaking, since this generally requires a curing chamber with controlled temperature and humidity for a period of weeks (in addition to the meat grinder and sausage stuffer you'd need for other sausages).

Check out the Charcuterie Resources Master List in the sidebar for a master list of charcuterie resources. Another book that is not listed there (I believe it came out after the list was compiled) is Salumi by Michael Ruhlman and Brian Polcyn, which is primarily concerned with dry curing and does get into fermented cured meats as well.

If you truly are interested in doing charcuterie right you need to do the butchering yourself. American butchers use bandsaws. Italian traditional butchers use a knife and gravity (Seam Butchery).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rVJXIF8SiJI

http://www.amazon.com/Salumi-Craft-Italian-Dry-Curing/dp/0393068595/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1394151271&sr=1-1&keywords=salami

https://www.facebook.com/groups/thesaltcuredpig/

Polcyn & Ruhlman's 'Salumi' book ( https://www.amazon.com/Salumi-Craft-Italian-Dry-Curing/dp/0393068595 ) has a detailed guide to breaking down a whole hog as well as recipes for the main whole muscle cures. (https://miro.medium.com/max/1494/0*1FDvSWCuwj1m2WfS.jpeg)

> I am hoping someone might know someone who knows or has even made Lardo in the past that could talk to me about it. I've debated going to a fabricator to make say a 1ft by 8inch by 8 inch cask with lid out of marble but I'm not sure exactly if that is necessary for the initial brining? Or is the marble mainly used as the curing room and should I look to have a hole drilled in the lid where I can suspend the fat while it cures.

Unfortunately the intersection of people who made lardo in traditional ways and people who go on reddit is really, really slim. While I have no direct advice to give you (never did any curing), I'll humbly suggest this book, which I've seen multiple times being referred to as the golden standard about Italian charcuterie making.

Edit:
Wait, I found the document which specifies what you can call Lardo di Colonnata by the law.
I'll translate the relevant part for you:
> This processing is seasonal, and is done between September and May (both included). The lard must be worked while very fresh. Before 72 hours have passed from the butchering, it has to be trimmed, massaged with salt and put in the marble vessel which have been previously rubbed with garlic, alternating layers of lard and other ingredients (pepper, rosemary, garlic), until the vessel is full. Then the vessel is closed. It will cure for at least 6 months. Curing must happen in a room with little aeration and without any air conditioning.

So it looks to me that there is no initial brining, just curing inside the casks. Other sources mention other spices as well (cinnamon, cloves, coriander, sage), and everybody agrees that temperature and humidity play a very important role, but I found no measurements.

The law paper above notes that the very particular weather in Colonnata (daily breeze, sun even in winter, low relative humidity but quite high in absolute values compared to neighboring towns) are crucial and not easy repeatable, but don't let this discourage you!

Books. You need them.

http://www.amazon.com/Charcuterie-Salting-Smoking-Revised-Updated/dp/0393240053

http://www.amazon.com/Salumi-The-Craft-Italian-Curing/dp/0393068595

http://www.amazon.com/In-The-Charcuterie-Sausage-Confits/dp/1607743434

http://www.amazon.com/Great-Sausage-Recipes-Meat-Curing/dp/0025668609

The sequel. Drops August 27th!

I actually still have a nice slab of his backfat vacuum packed in my freezer and was thinking about making some lardo with it. As soon as we got the piglet, I bought Ruhlman's Salumi. I have only scratched the surface, but I still have much of my shoulder portion left too, and I'm excited to do some dry cured stuff with it.

Check out this book.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0393068595?pc_redir=1410352835&robot_redir=1

I attended his class and read the book. Very useful.

This book is excellent: http://www.amazon.ca/Salumi-Craft-Italian-Dry-Curing/dp/0393068595/ref=sr_1_10?ie=UTF8&qid=1426269223&sr=8-10&keywords=ruhlman

Haven't tried it out but this one looks good.

I'd recommend, as would most other sausage makers, to start with the simplest sausage - the Saucisson Sec

Solid recipe and method.

Thing's you'll need - a meat grinder with either the fine or medium plate to get a good grind size. A sausage stuffer - many stand mixers have a meat grind/stuffer attachment that works quite well. I used the hand cranked giant tube stuffer at work. The process is pretty much the same.
Curing Salt and sugars - aka pink salt or Insta Cure and dextrose
Natural Casings.
Butchers twine
A needle of some sort
Time

So to start, you'd want to buy a pork butt/shoulder, and freeze it for a few days. This is the general procedure to stave off any sort of possible malady that could be lurking in the meat. When you're ready to make the sausage, just let it thaw somewhat in the fridge overnight.

You'll want to cut down your butt, fat and all, into chunks just small enough to fit into your meat grinder. Your hands will be freezing in this process, it sucks, but it's necessary. Once you chop it all up, put it in a big ass bowl and add your seasonings to the large chopped pieces. Mix it all up to try and coat all the meat, and then you're either off to the grinder or off to the fridge. Keeping the meat cold during the process is important, so if it starts to get warm from being handled, put it back in the fridge for a while.

Grinding - the day before you make your sausage, it's ideal to put as much of your meat grinder in the freezer as possible - the screw drive, hopper, plates, etc. This keeps them cold during the process and again prevents the meat from warming up too much. So once everythings attached, turn the thing on or get to hand cranking. Throw your meat in, and watch as it becomes ground perfection. Once its all ground, put it back in the fridge while you clean your grinder out, and prepare the casings.

Casings - they come packed in salt, so you want to first soak them in a large vessel of cool water. Then, you want to give the insides a rinse. What I do is just take out one casing, wrap it around the sink's nozzle (like a water balloon) and then flush it for a minute or two with cool water. This does 2 things - it lets you clean the inside, and it will also help you spot any holes. You can pinch off a segment towards the bottom, and let the casing fill with water for a moment. If it holds, there are no holes. If there are holes, you'll want to cut the casing where the hole is so its not in the middle of your sausage.

Stuffing - there's plenty of youtube videos of this processs, it's pretty simple. Just go slow, and keep your hands wet. You'll want to wet down the nozzle that the casing slides over so it slides off easily while its being stuffed. Tie a knot inthe casing hanging off the end, pull it tight against the opening (gently - casings are pretty strong and also extremely fragile at the same time), and slowly start stuffing. Let the pressure of the crank or machine fill the casing and feed the casing. If you notice an air bubble forming (its obvious) just take a knife and tap the casing on the nozzle, it will create a small enough hole to let the air out but not let a bunch of sausage ooze out. Make them as long or as short as you'd like. Twist them off to form links - for a home cure, i'd just do 2 links with an extra bit of casing between them so you can use the casing as a natural hanger.

Once you're done stuffing, you'll want to poke a bunch of teeny tiny holes in the sausages, especially around any airy spots that may not have stuffed perfectly against the casing. I used a 20 gauge needle for this, but a safety pin or sewing needle works just fine. Poke a fuck ton of holes all over the sausage. This lets out any air created by the fermentation process, allowing the casing to hug the meat inside. Air bubbles trapped between the casing and the meat are your enemy, they prevent good drying, and harbor bad bacteria.

Now its time to hang em!

If you've got a garage, or other cool spot (a closet in a room that's got the heat turned off?), just make up a coat hanger type deal to hang them, and let em be. Winter is a great time to cure since the humidity is high and temp is cool.

Check on them every now and then, and if you're noticing any white powdery stuff, leave it be. That's good. Blue fuzzy stuff is what you want to look out for - but in all honesty i'm not even sure if that's something to be afraid of. There's a lot of discussion on the topic of beneficial vs harmful molds, and there's really no telling who's right and wrong. A spray bottle of vinegar can help you keep them clean if you don't like the look of the white mold. Just spritz and wipe them off.

After about a month (if even) the sausages should be hard to the touch, the casings should be desicated, and if you squeeze, it shouldn't give much, ie it should be firm. Depending on your ratio of fat to lean muscle, the higher the fat, the softer the end product will be. So I recommend your first go with a leaner ratio to help you get a good feel for when it's done.

When its done, just package it how you see fit and store it in the fridge, or vacuum seal it and leave it out. It's a cured meat, it's meant to keep for a long time.

online resource

Another good resource - a really informative book detailing EVERYTHING you'd need to know from start to finish, including twine tying methods LINKY

Their other {book](https://www.amazon.com/Salumi-Craft-Italian-Dry-Curing/dp/0393068595/ref=pd_sim_14_1?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=XPHS6GG2XTCHV35FCGBE)
Goes a little more in depth for dry cured stuff, and might be more appropriate.

And then the man/myth/legend's own Blog