15th c. pepperoni
Jan. 19th, 2014 11:24 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
madbakerThis week's Resolution Recipe was going to be something else, but the sausages I put down to cure before Twelfth Night were ready now. It's been dry, so they lost the weight in three (!) weeks.
So: To Make Good Bolognese Sausage.
1000 g fatty pork shoulder butt
22 g salt
2.5 g curing salt #2
3 g pepper, ground
2 g peppercorns, whole or lightly crushed
55 mm sausage casings
1/8 teaspoon Mold-600 Bactoferm Sausage Mould
1/4 cup distilled water
Chop or grind the meat and mix in the spices. Rinse casings as needed. Knot bottom of each casing used; stuff and twist at six-inch lengths, piercing with a needle as necessary. Knot to finish. Cold smoke for two to six hours, depending on smokiness desired.
Half an hour before removing the sausages from the smoke, whisk together the Bactoferm Mould culture and the distilled water. Let sit for 30 minutes to activate. Coat the sausages with the mixture and then hang them in a cool spot around 50-53° F and 75-80% humidity to dry. Depending on the width of the casings used, they should hang 4-8 weeks until the sausages have lost approximately 30% of their weight.
I added the curing salt #2 for safety reasons; it helps prevent botulism bacteria from forming during the curing process and does not noticeably change the flavors. The Bactoferm sausage mould is a commercial culture of harmless edible mold used in modern processes to help prevent more toxic molds from forming; it also adds flavor and aids in the drying process.
According to Archaic Units of Measure, a pound in 16th century Naples was approximately 321 grams, or roughly 0.7 modern pounds; a Neapolitan pound was twelve ounces rather than the modern sixteen. All the other measurements have been scaled accordingly.
The original salt amount is 5% of the meat’s weight – the modern standard for safety (and flavor) is between 2 to 2.5%. I reduced the amount to make it more palatable as a stand-alone cured sausage.
Sources
Scully, Terence. The Neapolitan Recipe Collection: (New York, Pierpont Morgan Library, MS Bühler, 19) : a Critical Edition and English Translation. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan, 2000. Print. ISBN 0-472-10972-3.
Zupko, Ronald Edward. Italian Weights and Measures from the Middle Ages to the Nineteenth Century. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1981. Print.
What worked: I deliberately used 30mm casings to get them cured more quickly, because I wanted to test the recipe. Three weeks! This tasted like a good modern pepperoni: despite not having any chile powder, it was smoky, dense, and peppery from the ground and cracked pepper. It would be faboo on pizza. I usually add in back fat, but the shoulder was fatty enough that it was okay without it. Dense and without the little fat globules, kind of like a Slim Jim except actually good.
What didn't: I never got around to using the Bactoferm, and my current curing chamber doesn't have the mold inculcated.
Will I make it again? It's a non-scary period recipe, so sure. I'd like to make it with actual 50mm casings so I can slice it thinly.
So: To Make Good Bolognese Sausage.
Get twenty-five pounds of pork or veal from the haunch, without gristle or fat, and beat it as much as you can; for these twenty-five pounds of meat add in fifteen ounces of salt and one and a half ounces of ground and whole pepper; then get large intestines, clean and wash them well and fill them as tightly as you can with the meat and make them a hand’s length long after the Bolognese custom; then set them to dry in smoke. This is how a prince has them made. (Cuoco Napoletano, late 15th c.)
1000 g fatty pork shoulder butt
22 g salt
2.5 g curing salt #2
3 g pepper, ground
2 g peppercorns, whole or lightly crushed
55 mm sausage casings
1/8 teaspoon Mold-600 Bactoferm Sausage Mould
1/4 cup distilled water
Chop or grind the meat and mix in the spices. Rinse casings as needed. Knot bottom of each casing used; stuff and twist at six-inch lengths, piercing with a needle as necessary. Knot to finish. Cold smoke for two to six hours, depending on smokiness desired.
Half an hour before removing the sausages from the smoke, whisk together the Bactoferm Mould culture and the distilled water. Let sit for 30 minutes to activate. Coat the sausages with the mixture and then hang them in a cool spot around 50-53° F and 75-80% humidity to dry. Depending on the width of the casings used, they should hang 4-8 weeks until the sausages have lost approximately 30% of their weight.
I added the curing salt #2 for safety reasons; it helps prevent botulism bacteria from forming during the curing process and does not noticeably change the flavors. The Bactoferm sausage mould is a commercial culture of harmless edible mold used in modern processes to help prevent more toxic molds from forming; it also adds flavor and aids in the drying process.
According to Archaic Units of Measure, a pound in 16th century Naples was approximately 321 grams, or roughly 0.7 modern pounds; a Neapolitan pound was twelve ounces rather than the modern sixteen. All the other measurements have been scaled accordingly.
The original salt amount is 5% of the meat’s weight – the modern standard for safety (and flavor) is between 2 to 2.5%. I reduced the amount to make it more palatable as a stand-alone cured sausage.
Sources
Scully, Terence. The Neapolitan Recipe Collection: (New York, Pierpont Morgan Library, MS Bühler, 19) : a Critical Edition and English Translation. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan, 2000. Print. ISBN 0-472-10972-3.
Zupko, Ronald Edward. Italian Weights and Measures from the Middle Ages to the Nineteenth Century. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1981. Print.
What worked: I deliberately used 30mm casings to get them cured more quickly, because I wanted to test the recipe. Three weeks! This tasted like a good modern pepperoni: despite not having any chile powder, it was smoky, dense, and peppery from the ground and cracked pepper. It would be faboo on pizza. I usually add in back fat, but the shoulder was fatty enough that it was okay without it. Dense and without the little fat globules, kind of like a Slim Jim except actually good.
What didn't: I never got around to using the Bactoferm, and my current curing chamber doesn't have the mold inculcated.
Will I make it again? It's a non-scary period recipe, so sure. I'd like to make it with actual 50mm casings so I can slice it thinly.
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no subject
Date: 2017-01-01 04:42 pm (UTC)2. For me, one of the crucial elements of pizza pepperoni is fennel. But I suspect that we can just go ahead and add that ourselves.
3. I'll have to figure out where/how to get the Bactoferm or equivalent. Is this the sort of thing you can get by mail order? (That's how I get my beef bung because my local butcher doesn't carry it.)
4. "piercing with a needle as necessary." How do I know when/if it is necessary?
no subject
Date: 2017-01-01 07:22 pm (UTC)3. Butcher & Packer is from whom I order everything charcuterie-related. They have good quality at reasonable prices.
4. Heh. When you stuff sausages, especially when you are not accustomed to it, you often end up with air pockets. These if left alone can encourage the growth of bad bacteria. At the very least they also form unsightly holes in the interior for the finished product.