Homemade Sausage Making

I just removed my Coppa from my curing chamber after 17 days which was set at approx. 60 degrees F and 60% humidity. The starting weight was 2994 grams and the finish weight was 2120 about a 30% loss. This is a Len Polis recipe. I used cure #1 and collagen casing. The Coppa however is very soft to the touch. I cut it in half and it looks like an aged piece of meat dark brown edges and a dark red interior. Very nice looking but nothing I would eat without cooking. Is this safe to eat if cooked or can I hang It longer. I'm reluctant because I used cure #1. I wasn't looking for a product that must be cooked before eating. Any opinions? Thanks Tom

Hi Tom,
30% weightloss is not enough. Hang both pieces again with the cut ends covered again until they reach a 38-40% plus weightloss. I have dried Coppa's more by blowing a fan over them. It could cause a hard rim but if you vacuum them in a ribbed vacuumbag, they should equalise vey well.
I have been using UMAi bags for drying Coppas for some time now, try them out. I did and the results were good, no curing chamber required, just your kitchen fridge.
Good Luck Mate,
Jan.

Tom-
Unless previously certified or frozen to treat for trichinosis, To be safe to eat raw:

USDA Code:
(iii) Coppa. Boneless pork butts for coppa shall be cured in a dry-curing mixture containing not less than 41/2 pounds of salt per hundredweight of meat for a period of not less than 18 days at a temperature not lower than 36 °F. If the curing mixture is applied to the butts by the process known as churning, a small quantity of pickle may be added. During the curing period the butts may be overhauled according to any of the usual processes of overhauling, including the addition of pickle or dry salt if desired. The butts shall not be subjected during or after curing to any treatment designed to remove salt from the meat, except that superficial washing may be allowed. After being stuffed, the product shall be held in a drying room not less than 35 days at a temperature not lower than 45 °F.

Trichinosis is quite rare today in commercial pork so its a personal call.


Even if you used cure #1 you should be ok to hang it longer as the AW has been lowered.
If you leave them in the chamber for 60 -90 days the flavor and texture will improve a lot.
You will still have to slice paper thin...or they can be very chewy.

Thanks for the info Bob K. This is getting very exasperating, I try and follow a recipe from an expert and they don't mention anything about the lengths of time your talking about. Your time frame makes much more sense judging the outcome of my projects. The reason I like to use recipes that have been proven is I feel safe attempting the project. Not so much now as they seem to leave out a lot of detail. I don't feel safe only using cure#1 for anything over 30 days. I'm not that educated in the finer elements of curing meats. For now I want to stick to something simple, safe and proven. As far as I'm concerned my Pancetta and Coppa project were failures. I need a recipe that is more detailed for Coppa and a few other simple whole meat cuts. Any suggestions.

Tom-
Here are a few that will get you started:

https://ourdailybrine.com/how-to-make-r ... ta-recipe/

http://curedmeats.blogspot.com/search/l ... -%20Recipe


Maybe Redzed and others can help out also.

Jan

Thanks for the input but at this point I will be getting rid of the Coppa as I like to be on the safe side and using cure#1 for longer periods makes me uncomfortable. I tried cooking some but it's not all that tasty cooked. I check into the Umai bags to expensive for my tastes for what you get.

Bob K wrote:Tom-
Unless previously certified or frozen to treat for trichinosis, To be safe to eat raw:

USDA Code:
(iii) Coppa. Boneless pork butts for coppa shall be cured in a dry-curing mixture containing not less than 41/2 pounds of salt per hundredweight of meat for a period of not less than 18 days at a temperature not lower than 36 °F. If the curing mixture is applied to the butts by the process known as churning, a small quantity of pickle may be added. During the curing period the butts may be overhauled according to any of the usual processes of overhauling, including the addition of pickle or dry salt if desired. The butts shall not be subjected during or after curing to any treatment designed to remove salt from the meat, except that superficial washing may be allowed. After being stuffed, the product shall be held in a drying room not less than 35 days at a temperature not lower than 45 °F.

Trichinosis is quite rare today in commercial pork so its a personal call.


Even if you used cure #1 you should be ok to hang it longer as the AW has been lowered.
If you leave them in the chamber for 60 -90 days the flavor and texture will improve a lot.
You will still have to slice paper thin...or they can be very chewy.
[url=http://i1289.photobucket.com/albums/b51 ... 06cd0e.jpg]Image[/URL]

is there a link to the USDA food code. I am interested in the other requirements the USDA has on items such as pancetta, etc.

Link

https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/9/318.10

Bob K wrote:Link

https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/9/318.10

Perfect thank you! I have been lurking on the forum for a few months now and have made some nice items. Coppa, pancetta, bresaola, krainerwurst and kabanosy. I am glad to be a member now to learn more!

Kaiser wrote:Perfect thank you! I have been lurking on the forum for a few months now and have made some nice items. Coppa, pancetta, bresaola, krainerwurst and kabanosy. I am glad to be a member now to learn more!

Welcome to the group Kaiser! How about showing us some of those goodies you have been making so that we can drool over them?

redzed wrote:

Kaiser wrote:Perfect thank you! I have been lurking on the forum for a few months now and have made some nice items. Coppa, pancetta, bresaola, krainerwurst and kabanosy. I am glad to be a member now to learn more!

Welcome to the group Kaiser! How about showing us some of those goodies you have been making so that we can drool over them?[url=http://www.sherv.net/cm/emoticons/hungry/lick-lips.gif]Image[/URL]

best canadian bacon i've ever had.


Polish Keilbasa before and after



Krainerwurst (smoked slovenian sausage) before and after
This recipe I modified from Chuckwagons, that is how i originally found this website. I've been on a mission to replicate a family sausage tradition and with your help i was successful.



Bresaola


I don't have any other good photos. I have a bradley 6 rack smoker and I converted a pepsi merchandising cooler to our drying chamber. The bresaola was my first time and it came out delicious, it had a hard rim at first, but after a week in cryovac that softened nicely. Right now in my chamber is a pork belly for pancetta, and still in salt I have a coppa, still needs a few days before heading to the chamber.

Tom - you got most of the info you need from earlier posts. In no way would I point anyone away from Lens site (I learned a lot from there in my early days and gotten some great recipes). However a few of the recipes appear to have been from his early days and are salt heavy (I use 2.5-3% for coppa). In addition the curing time for the coppa is way too short in my experience. After the initial rubs and casing them I hang in temps closer to 50F, 75% humidity, for 8-12 weeks, weight loss much closer to 40%. They are well worth another shot......I'm now doing 100-150lbs per year. My little one (4 years old) eats some several times per week and my wife has forbid me from ever running out. So, try cutting salt to something closer to 3%, try to keep humidity in the 70%-75% range, expect something closer to 3 months and 40% total weight loss, you wont be disappointed.

Hey Kaiser that's great work, you are making great progress for a newbie and probably getting hooked like the rest of us here. It's a great hobby and darned more rewarding than building birdhouses!

Eric your coppa collection looks like it's in an art gallery. And such perfect mould growth! What are you casing them in?

Appreciate the kind words!! Like many of us it wasn't so pretty, or easy in the beginning. I've had my share of failures when I started out - that's why I wanted to chime in to encourage. It's important for folks starting out to understand that for most of us there was/will be a learning curve. It's worth the initial frustration since once you get the hang of it, it becomes [relatively] consistent.

On the coppa - beef bungs, 5"+ and they allow me to easily get two in each casing as those diameters seem to consistently be much longer than the smaller diameters. Cultured mold applied (the ones without thorough coverage were only hanging a few days but are now totally covered as well). I was lucky enough in the states to find a local wholesaler who sells to the public by the case and stocks CT butts in the 3-4 pound range. Makes doing mass quantities pretty painless.

Work consumes a lot of my time so I'm on here infrequently now but wanted to take the time to say this site was (and is) invaluable, especially when I started out. My thanks to everyone for providing a forum where newbies can get advice, work through their failures and ultimately get to enjoy wonderful cured meats!!

Eric-
Is that a room/area dedicated to a drying chamber?