Food curing dates back to ancient times, in the form of both salt-cured and smoked meat. It was used then, and is still used today – to both preserve and add flavour to the meat.
How does curing work?
It depends upon the exact curing method used, but let’s take a look at main reactions going on:
Salt – works by dehydrating the meat, and hence prevents the growth of bacteria by creating a fairly inhospitable environment. Salting also causes proteins to come to the surface and then solidify – such as in sausages.
Sugar – often added in the form of honey, corn syrup and maple syrup; the main function of the sugar is negate the saltiness. With the exception of bacon, it contributes very little to the overall flavour, yet is still essential.
Nitrites and Nitrates – help to kill the bacteria, as well as giving meat a nice red colour.
Smoke – primarily used for flavour, though smoke molecules also bind to the surface of the meat inhibiting growth of bacteria. Carbon or soot molecules however are undesirable and so generally avoided by controlling the humidity and temperature in the smoking environment.
How to Cure Your Own Ham:
Curing is surprisingly simple, but you’ll need to buy some “Instacure” or similar purpose-made curing salt, which has a suitable amount of curing Nitrites pre-added into the salt mix. Also, bear in mind that Nitrites in high concentrations are toxic, so measure carefully.
Buy a fresh ham – a fresh hing leg section of a pig. Obviously, you don’t want one that has been cured already as that would totally defeat the whole point of curing it yourself.
Next, you need mix up a brine. Here’s the recipe I usually use, though I claim no credit for it myself:
- 2 litres of water
- 3/4 cup kosher salt
- 1 packed cup brown sugar
- 4 teaspoons “instacure” or “pink salt”
If you’re doing a whole ham, you will probably need to double the above amounts. To prepare, simply stir them all together until it’s all dissolved.
You’ll also need a bowl or bucket big enough to hold your whole leg but also small enough to fit in the fridge. Put the pork into the bucket and submerge with brine. You’ll soon find out if you’ve made enough or not! You can lay a heavy plate on top of the ham to keep it submerged.
Keep it in the fridge until done, bearing in mind it will cure about 2 pounds of meat in a day. A large ham may take up to a week to fully cure.
finally, you can smoke it too if you wish but that’s out of the scope of this articles. Personally, I prefer to just slice it off and fry it, or bake it into a nice pasta dish or two. If you find the taste too salty, you can always soak it again in water for a few hours to draw out some of the salt.
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