Homemade Sausage Making

I plan on making 10 lbs of Salumi Genoa tomorrow, using a 40/40/20 mix of lean eye of round beef, pork shoulder, and hard pork back fat.

Recipe is the one Bob K posted the link to.

Going to use the below percentages, just wanted to see if anyone hand any last minute addtions or suggested recipe changes that I might need to consider?

100% 40/40/20 meat mix
2.80% sea salt
0.25% cure #2
0.40% dextrose
0.30% demarara sugar
0.30% white pepper
0.10% garlic powder
0.022% B-LC-007 starter culture in 30ml water, let bloom 30 mins, dilute to 60ml and add to ground meat and mix and stuff into casings (using 55mm-60mm cut & tied beef middles)

In particular, can I add a handful of toasted black Telicherry peppercorns to the mix before stuffing?

And is the 0.10% garlic powder enough to taste?

I will be using my Hanna Halo PH meter to test the meat mix, so what PH should I take them to?

Does the PH depend on the starter culture (for example B-LC-007 is always done fermenting when PH is X.X?)
Or does it depend on how acidic (tangy) my personal tastes are?

I have read that PH needs to be below 5.3 minimum, to be at a safe PH level.
And that levels below 5.0 (ie. 4.9, 4.8, 4.7) the salumi will start to take on a more pronounced acidic "tang" which may or may not be desireable?

Is 4.9 PH the "normal" level to start seeing what my tastes like?
I have never had a good PH meter, so this will be my first time actually fermenting to a specific target PH over a period of time.

What PH should I aim for using -007 starter culture?

Plan is to ferment at 22-24C at 90%RH until "X" PH is obtained.

Can someone help me fill in "X" PH above?

Thanks for the help!
Jason

harleykids wrote:I plan on making 10 lbs of Salumi Genoa tomorrow, using a 40/40/20 mix of lean eye of round beef, pork shoulder, and hard pork back fat.

Recipe is the one Bob K posted the link to.

Going to use the below percentages, just wanted to see if anyone hand any last minute addtions or suggested recipe changes that I might need to consider?

100% 40/40/20 meat mix
2.80% sea salt
0.25% cure #2
0.40% dextrose
0.30% demarara sugar
0.30% white pepper
0.10% garlic powder
0.022% B-LC-007 starter culture in 30ml water, let bloom 30 mins, dilute to 60ml and add to ground meat and mix and stuff into casings (using 55mm-60mm cut & tied beef middles)

In particular, can I add a handful of toasted black Telicherry peppercorns to the mix before stuffing? Should be no problem if you like whole peppercorns.

And is the 0.10% garlic powder enough to taste? Might be a lttle low, but again garlic is a matter of personal taste. I use .2%

I will be using my Hanna Halo PH meter to test the meat mix, so what PH should I take them to? If you want a mild Southern European flavour take it to just under 5.3. When 5 or lower you will have a tangy flavour which will increase the lower you take it.

Does the PH depend on the starter culture (for example B-LC-007 is always done fermenting when PH is X.X?) The pH target is the same whatever culture you use. But the bacterial strains and the temp will determine the speed of the fermentation. The amount of sugar will determine the final pH as the bacteria will continue to multiply and produce acid as long as it has a food source. For mild flavour salami you want slower acidification and time for the cocci to reduce the nitrates and develop flavour and colour.

Or does it depend on how acidic (tangy) my personal tastes are?

I have read that PH needs to be below 5.3 minimum, to be at a safe PH level.
And that levels below 5.0 (ie. 4.9, 4.8, 4.7) the salumi will start to take on a more pronounced acidic "tang" which may or may not be desireable?

Is 4.9 PH the "normal" level to start seeing what my tastes like?
I have never had a good PH meter, so this will be my first time actually fermenting to a specific target PH over a period of time.

What PH should I aim for using -007 starter culture? There no "correct" answer, but if you want a mild tasting salami take it to 5.2. You have 72 hours to reach this.

Plan is to ferment at 22-24C at 90%RH until "X" PH is obtained. If I were doing it I would prefer slower fermentation and not take it over 22C

Can someone help me fill in "X" PH above?

Thanks for the help!
Jason

You have over 3% salt, and unless you like a salty tasting salami, you might want to lower that amount.

Since you also like high mould colonization, and that, together with the yeast in the culture as well as the cocci will raise your pH during the drying stages, so you still should have a mild tasting product even if you take it to 5 or slightly under. You can put that new meter to work and give us progress reports on the fall and rise of the pH throughout the process.

I'm not sure whether using demerara sugar with 007 is a good idea. L. sakei and S. carnosus don't work with saccharose. But then .4% glucose should be enough to complete the fermentation.

redzed wrote:You have over 3% salt, and unless you like a salty tasting salami, you might want to lower that amount.

That was a big red flag for me --- Depending on the salame I do 2% salt normally and occasionally as high as 2.25% salt

The culture called for in the Marianski recipe is T-SPX which will ferment sugar. You are using 007 so can eliminate the sugar or add a lesser amount.

Adjust the spices to taste, however the low amount of spices is really excellent "as is"

I think 5.0 - 5.1 is a good target Ph. Previously you did not have an accurate way to measure the ph. So you were urged to ferment longer to err on the side of safety.

As far as salt I would drop it to 2.5., Much lower that that raises some safety concerns.

Bob K wrote: As far as salt I would drop it to 2.5., Much lower that that raises some safety concerns.

2% salt + 0.25% cure #2 = 2.25% total -- still safe

1.85% salt + 0.25% cure #2 = 2.10% still safe

These numbers I use within my business --- the key thing is never change the cure % salt can and is -- with that being said I will not argue the point as it has got me tossed off here before so it might be just as well if i just read ........

Thanks Guys, your suggestions are very helpful!

So, based on the input, I think the below is what I will do (unless you see any other issues?)

100% 40/40/20 meat mix
2.50% sea salt
0.25% cure #2
0.40% dextrose
0.30% white pepper
0.15% garlic powder
0.022% B-LC-007 starter culture in 30ml water, let bloom 30 mins, dilute to 60ml and add to ground meat and mix and stuff into casings (using 55mm-60mm cut & tied beef middles)

Ferment at 20-22C @ 90% RH, to final PH of 5.2

I lowered the salt to 2.5% (2.75% total with cure #2) removed the demarara sugar completely, and bumped up the garlic powder to 0.15%

Sound about right?

thanks!

Thanks BriCan!

I like my salumi a tad on the salty side. I used 2.75% total in my sopressatta (2.5%+0.25% #2) and we liked it. Enough salt to taste, but not too much. My wife doesnt like alot of salt on anything, and she thought the sopressatta was spot on salinity-wise.

So I will try the 2.5% salt (2.75% total) again and see if it makes a difference when there are less spice ingredients.

Sounds like a plan Jason. Like you I have no objections taste-wise to salt in the 2.5-3.0% range in dry cured products.

Robert-
Feel free to voice your opinion on salt. Your comments and expertise are valued here. We could start another discussion.....The old Sheriff rode off into the sunset

Bob K wrote: Robert-
Feel free to voice your opinion on salt. Your comments and expertise are valued here. We could start another discussion.....The old Sheriff rode off into the sunset

Being ostracized was one thing, but to erase all my post and write ups has left me a little gun shy so to speak

I am still feeling my way around

Alright, so this was the worst fiasco I have had so far in making salumi.

Whatever could go wrong, did go wrong.

I had previously frozen my chunks of beef (4 lbs) lean pork (4 lb) and hard back fat (2lb) so I put them out to thaw just a bit. But left my 2 lb of fat in the freezer, didn't want to thaw it.

Got out my #22 grinder, put all my parts in the freezer and waited 30 mins.

Started grinding the pretty much still frozen meat, no problems at all.
Got to the frozen fat, and it pretty much came out like noodles.
Didn't grind in "flakes" like my other fat had. But the fat I was griding was still frozen!

So I figured my grinder head had warmed up, so I separated all the fat noodles from the meat, and put them in the freezer along with the grinder head, plate, knife, auger, etc.

I should probably also mention that up until now I have been using the 10mm plate when making my sopressatta, pepperoni, chorizo, etc.

For this Salami Genoa, I thouht a smaller mince might be nice...the store bought Genoa seems to have a finer mince than the typical rustic type salumi.

So I used my 4.5mm plate for this gring (meat and fat both)
My grinder only came with a kidney plate, a 4.5mm plate, and a 10mm plate (LEM #22 Big bite girinder)

I figure one of my mistakes was taking 1" cubes and trying to grind them thru a 4.5mm plate first-pass? But they always grind great thru my 10mm tube first pass, so I wouldn't think the 4.5mm plate would make that big a difference. And my fat was 100% frozen, that wasnt the issue. Not sure what the issue was to make fat noodles...and I am also 100% sure it was hard back fat, so that can't be the issue either.

I waited about 2 hours and then dragged out the parts and fat from the freezer. Ran the fat thru the grinder again, and SAME thing happened! Noodles instead of flakes!

At this point I had been working on this Genoa project for about 4 hours, waiting for parts and fat to freeze, etc. It was around midnight now and I should have been done 3 hours ago.

So I said screw it...I put the meat and fat in a tub and stuck it in the freezer with the grinder parts.

This morning I got up, and pulled the tub from the freezer, mixed in my spice blend and starter culture, and this is what the mix looked like below. You could make a ball if you squeezed the meat tight and it would stick together. But it was not like my other salumi before where is was more sticky and wet looking. This was more grainy looking, if that makes sense:





I let ithe mix warm up just a bit, since it was like frozen pellets, and then stuffed it into my beef middles (they also suffered...they basically got to soak overnight in the fridge for 18 hours, instead of 1 hour like normal)

Believe it or not, it stuffed very nicely, I was surprised as it had been one problem after another the night before.

Anyway, I got them stuffed and hung in my oven. Since they were pretty much frozen, they need to warm up to temp so I can use my PH meter. One of them was so cold that after hanging for 15 mins the OUTSIDE of the casing had ice on it!

I will post my initial thoughts on the Hanna Halo PH meter in another thread under equipment.
Starting PH for this batch of meat is 5.82 per my calibrated PH meter.

For now I guess its a waiting game to see if I have fat smearing, frozen meat issues, etc.
Who knows...this one was pretty fraught with problems.

Never had this many issues before, felt like I was de-evolving from the salumi game!
Oh, well, I guess I will see if these turn out OK, or if they get thrown out like my Chorizo did.

harleykids wrote:Started grinding the pretty much still frozen meat, no problems at all.
Got to the frozen fat, and it pretty much came out like noodles.

Are you grinding the meat and fat separately...if so why?

From the Marianski recipe:
Grind pork and back fat through 3/8" plate (10 mm). Grind beef with 1/8" plate.

Ok if you don't have the smaller 1/8 (3mm) plate for the beef. But grinding fat separately, even frozen, almost always ends up with mixing/fat smearing problems.

I understand what you said about the store bought Genoa looking finer.

yes, I ground all the meats separately (into the same bowl)
so not really separately, just one after the other.

So I need to simply mix my cubed pork with my cubed back fat and push that whole mix thru the grinder a the same time, correct? Not grind each separately.

But I didn't us the 10mm plate for the pork and fat, I used the 4.5mm plate for everything.

Maybe the mistake was as simple as using too small a plate for the first pass grind?
Oh, yeah, and not reading the instructions on the recipe!

Based on the pics, does it look like I will have an issue with fat smearing?
The meat was frozen when stuffed into the casing, and it stuffed nicely.

Maybe being frozen saved me from smearing fat on the inner surface of my casings?

harleykids wrote:So I need to simply mix my cubed pork with my cubed back fat and push that whole mix thru the grinder a the same time, correct? Not grind each separately.

Yes mix together and then grind!
If you had done that you should have been ok with the smaller plate. Be aware that a coarser grind will make it easier to dry, as the water has an easier route to the surface.

harleykids wrote:Maybe the mistake was as simple as using too small a plate for the first pass grind?
Oh, yeah, and not reading the instructions on the recipe!

Based on the pics, does it look like I will have an issue with fat smearing?
The meat was frozen when stuffed into the casing, and it stuffed nicely.

Maybe being frozen saved me from smearing fat on the inner surface of my casings?

Hard to tell on the fat smearing, if it stuffed ok and had definition you should be fine.

All of us have screwed up trying to improve/ modify a recipe

Salumi PH update:

Starting PH at 10:30am this morning was 5.82 @ 26 deg F

12 hours into fermentation and PH is now 5.72 @ 74 deg F

Seems to make sense as the salumi were 26 deg F when I hung them in the chamber at 10:30am this morning. Probably took a good 4-6 hours just to warm up to 70 degrees!
So my -007 starter culture had to wait a long time to warm up, so hopefully it will get started now!

Should get a pretty decent PH drop in the next 12-24 hours, if everything progresses as it should. Fermentation chamber (oven) shows 22 deg C @ 88% RH so it's doing its part as it should.

Jason-

A few things that may help in future batches.

Mix the meat and fat chunks together, along with the spices, culture and cure, before grinding. You get a head start on mixing which can help prevent fat smearing from over mixing.
I believe Evan at Butchers Pantry also recommends mixing culture and spices before grinding.


You need to mix well enough to form a sticky mix (develop the proteins) before stuffing. Prevents chubs from being crumbly and also helps to prevent air pockets.

Before and after mixing. I use a mixer because my hands no longer like the cold.