Sopressata Part 1

Got the meat curing tonight. The pork but is from Cardona's on Delaware. After preparing this, they are my new official supplier of sausage pork. Pork looked and smelled good. I look forward to trying it in some fresh sausage in a few weeks - this years Summer in February celebration is on Valentine's Day and I'll be making some for that. Here is the sopressata recipe I am using. The proportions are basically ripped from the pages of Charcuterie. The two numbers in yellow are a guess. The total meat and fat number is correct. I will look and see how the meat is grinding later this week. I might add some more fat. The meat/fat ratio of the pork looked good to me. Hard to be sure though.

Ingredient	Weight (g)	% ingredient	Notes
Meat	1686	1	Grind fine
Belly fat	562	0.25	Grind coarse
Total meat and fat	2448	1
Salt	44	0.0178
Instacure #2	7	0.0027
hot pepper	2	0.0009
Garlic, fresh	7	0.0027	Fine mince
Pepper, white	3	0.0013	Coarse grind
White Wine	65	0.0267	Dry
Dextrose powder	33	0.0133
Bactoferm F-RM-52	1	0.0004	Disperse in water
Water, cold	65	0.0267
non fat dry milk powder	76	0.0311

Here's what I did tonight starting with gathering all the seasonings. From the right: garlic, cure#2, dextrose, salt, white pepper, hot pepper and wine. The bactoferm stays in the freezer expect when I'm using it, the bottle of distilled water was handy enough and the non-fat milk powder will be added later.

 

The wine was recommended buy a salesmen at All Star Wines in Latham. The recipe calls for a Pinot Bianco. I've never had one and he recommended this Pinot Gris. I'm not much of a white wine guy. I always go red. A true connoisseur.  I was pleasantly surprised by this wine. It is very sweet, but has a nice flavor that I hope intensifies as the sopressata dries. 65 milliliters for the salami, the rest is for me. Here's 3 grams of bactoferm weighed out. It gets dissolved in the distilled water.

And then everything is measured and ready for mixing. I cut the pork into long strips. I read on THE Sausage Debauchery that the pork just swirls around the auger and grinds easily. Definitely worth a try. If it isn't working for me, the pieces will be easy enough to cube.

Off to the fridge for a few days for the bactoferm to bloom. I didn't get around to setting up the curing chamber today. Should only take a few minutes tomorrow. Grinding and stuffing should be Wednesday or Thursday night.