Homemade Sausage Making

Hello to all. First, I would like to thank all of you for the great ideas and insights. I've built my smoke house, and cured some meats thanks to the great ideas and documentation that is on this website.
Recently, I have just tried my hand at fermented sausage and am in the final weeks of curing and drying salami finocchiona.....probably not the best choice for a beginner, but a challenge. Everything seems to be going well with weight reduction and pH. Natural white mold is forming nicely with no colored molds or bad smells present. My question is the following:

I made about 10 lbs and would like to know if it is ok to vacuum pack and freeze a fermented sausage after it has been sliced. I'm guessing that it would make for a mushy mess after thawing.............Any ideas would be appreciated....Thank You.

Well if it makes it to the freezer....none of mine ever has.

Remove the casing which also removes the mold layer before vac sealing. Without O2 the mold will die and the casing and mold will get a bit slimy. It can then be stored without freezing in the fridge for several months.

You can also wrap in a paper bag or roll up in some parchment paper and store in the fridge for a month or so...before slicing. (Best method I have used.)


Just my non-expert experience.

Gunny wrote:I'm guessing that it would make for a mushy mess after thawing..............

Hi Gunny and wellcome to this bunch of Ferment´Nutties! Yes - I´also fear that the mix of vacuum + freezing could make the fat pieces seperate from the meat once you thaw and open. I´d rather freeze a whole piece for slicing after thawing but can´t say whether it will cause an unwanted change of consistency.
Why not try out a variety of methods; vacuum/nonsliced/nonfrozen/, vacuum/sliced/nonfrozen, vaccuum/nonsliced/frozen, etc. to enable evaluation of what suits you best? Otherwise stick to Bobs advice; roll up in paper and store in the fridge.

Hi Gunny,
My Italian friends always store fully dried salami in a large stainless container covered in oil.
I have done that many years ago as well when I lived in a cold climate with great results.
The container was stored in their cellar with all the other preserves and bottled plonk.
Try it out.
Cheers,
Jan.

Wrapping fermented sausages in parchment paper and then keeping in the fridge has worked best for me.

I tried vacuum sealing, and they got slimy.

I want to try the olive oil method.

Hey Crusty0 - what is plonk??

Sorry Mate,
Plonk, Terps is wine, Red or White. It's good Australian Slang.
I have never tried Olive oil but the light variety should be OK Not overpowering.
I always used either rapeseed or grapeseed oil, whatever I could get in a 25 litre containers.
Never had any problems.
I will phone my Italian friends this week to see if they changed their process.
Good Luck Mate,
Cheers,
Jan.

Thank you to all for the quick responses. Really helpful information. BTW, Crusty old boy, is it Shiraz or Syrah for those great Australian wines? Wife was also wanting to know what plonk was. Cabonaia had that taken care of.
My other question regarding the olive oil treatment is the following: Are the sausages submerged in the olive oil or just covered with a light coating and then stored in the stainless container?
I'll have more questions as time and projects develop....Jerald

Hi Jerald,
The salamis are packed in a large vessel, either stainless or glass etc. and totally covered in oil. I usually had 2 or 3 old dinner plates on top as a weight to keep them submerged.
I had them stored in a stainless 50 litre milk can.
Australia is a large producer and exporter of quality wines. At the moment we still have a wine mountain here, they can sell it all and subsequently wine is cheap. Some bottles come now with a sticker on them and no label to save money.
Some good wines on special sell here locally for $ 12.00 for a carton of six.
Cheers,
Jan.

Hello Jan,

Thanks for the additional information. Yesterday, I opened up my first attempt at fermented sausage. The wife and I are still standing this morning, so I must have done something right according to her. Flavor took me back to the late 50's when my father sold meats in his mom and pop grocery store. Having commercially made fermented sausage from Volpi (local maker in ST. Louis), I noticed the tremendous difference in saltyness and sour. I used TSP culture for the slow ferment. It took about 22 days to get the > 30% weight loss, so additional drying should improve the flavor.

$2 a bottle wine? We can't even get a cheap sip and go wine around here for that price........Wife is the local sommelier for wines with reds being her favorite. Chardonnay went well with our new fermented sausage.

Again, I couldn't have done this without the help of this forum and the Marianski series of books.

Take Care Jan........................Jerald

Hey, hey, Gunny....
Be sure not to miss the information (Marianski) at this link: http://www.meatsandsausages.com/sausage ... calculator
Besides the cure calculator, there's a wealth of information if you click on the topics at the top of the page. It's nice to have you with us Gunny.

Best Wishes,
Chuckwagon

I have had quite a few of my Italian friends put their salami in olive oil as well & it will stay for years, much the same as pickled eggplant or olives. I think that once it has fully cured that you can just keep it in the fridge or cooler for a while, after all when I go to my local Italian import store they keep all the salami's & pepperoni's in the cooler without any plastic wrap at all.

All Great information. Just one additional point of clarification........If you use the olive oil method of preservation, do you leave the casing on with the white penicillium mold, or is it best to remove the casing before immersion? Thank you to all for the welcome and advice..........Jerald

Hello Jerald,

In Italy it is common practice among the large salami producers to de-mold the surface of the casing by some kind of dusting-off practice and replace the mold with starch (potato starch) to preserve the nice white appearance.

This mentioned because I would personally be reluctant to remove the casing itself, but would probably at least try to get as much mold off the surface as possible before the drowning takes place...

Another rural practice I have encountered in Croatia is using melted pork fat instead of oil in which you submerge the sausages. It gave quite some aroma to the sausage which I tasted -though this was a smoked/boiled country sausage. But might work with fermented sausages too

Hi Gunny,
I always brushed off the mould very well before submerging the salamies in oil. As alhunter63 said before, they will keep for a very long time.
I did found out that the olive leaves a flavour behind, OK if you like it but I want my salamies to taste like salamies so I finished up using grapeseed oil exclusively.
Good Luck Mate,
Cheers,
Jan.

I visited family in the Azores some years ago, and they kept their sausage in lard. As refrigeration was very expensive, they just kept the lard and sausages in a cool dark place. The go-to sausage was linguica, which was different than the linguica here. It was darker, and more heavily smoked. So I imagine it kept better that way in the lard. No doubt the lard was used for cooking eventually.