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(NB: This comprehensive index was prepared by Chris Hennes.)

Charcuterie
The Craft of Salting, Smoking, and Curing


Michael Ruhlman and Brian Polcyn
Published by W. W. Norton (November 21, 2005)
Forward by Thomas Keller

The original "Cooking (or curing) from Charcuterie" topic is one of the all-time most popular topics on the eGullet forums, and the depth and breadth of information in it is truly astonishing. What follows is a list of commonly asked questions with links to the post (or posts) that best answer the inquiry. In addition we are providing a table of contents below with links to some of the most thorough results posts for each recipe.

The original topic has been closed, and as discussion continues on this new topic, we ask that posters keep their posts focused on recipes and techniques from the book itself, and small modifications to those recipes. As this book seems to have sparked (or at least fanned the flames!) of a tremendous amount of interest in charcuterie, most individual charcuterie items have other topics devoted to them: you can use the eGullet forums search engine top help you find the best place for your post.

Thanks, and happy curing!

Other Charcuterie-related Topics to Consult

• Making Bacon
• Making Sausage
• Making Guanciale
• Smoking Brisket
• Making Pastrami
• Smoking Turkey
• Making pork butt (a.k.a. "Behold my Butt!")
• Smoking Misc. Meats
• Meat Grinders
• Meat Slicers
• Sausage Stuffers
• Smokers
• Cellars and Chambers for Curing and Aging
• Food safety

Topic Index

Frequently Asked Questions

Salt Curing FAQs

• How long do I cure a Salmon filet?
• Can I salt cure whitefish other than Cod?
• How do I use wine in a cure?
• Can I add booze to my cures?
• How much salt should I use for a five pound pork belly?
• How much liquid should my belly give off when curing?
• Can I make bacon with skin-off pork bellies?
• I ran out of time to smoke my bacon: can it wait a few more days?
• My belly is soft, what do I do?
• What size bags should I use for curing bacon?
• What's the deal with "nitrite free" bacon?
• How long can I store cured bacon before I have to smoke it?

General Sausage FAQs

• When is it most critical to keep the meat cold? When can I be more relaxed?
• My forcemeat seems "gritty" -- what's that all about?
• What does a broken sausage look like?
• Can I mix stuff together today and grind it up tomorrow?
• Is it really critical to cook sausages to only 150 degrees F?
• Why do I get "cracks" between the meat inside my stuffed sausages?
• What are the white "spider" lines on the surface of my natural casings? See also this.
• When I stuff casings they puff up with air: how do I prevent this?
• Should I twist the links as I stuff, or wait until the end?
• How do I use sheep casings without tearing them?
• How do I get collagen casings to form links?
• What holds the sausage in the casing once they've been cut apart?
• How full should I stuff the casings?
• How should I store my finished sausages?
• Can I use rendered/cooked fat instead of fatback?
• Can I use frozen, salt-added blood for my boudin noir?
• What makes a good hot dog?
• Do I have to use fresh pork for the sausages, or can it be frozen?
• Do I have to poach Boudin Noir before freezing it?
• Should I use phosphates in my sausages to help with emulsion?
• Do I have to use shoulder in my sausages?

Dry-Curing FAQs

• Can I dry-cure in a regular refrigerator, next to last week's chicken salad?
• Are there any dry-cured products I can make in a regular refrigerator?
• Can I cure my pancetta with the skin still on?
• What do I do if the outside of my sausage is hard but the inside is soft?
• Why is my jowl turning green?
• How do I measure the pH of cased sausages that are dry curing?
• What controls the level of acidity in dry-cured sausages? See also this.
• Why do the recipes call for so much Bactoferm?
• Can I leave out the Bactoferm?
• How should I store my Bactoferm?
• How long will Bactoferm keep in a household freezer? See also this.
• What is the difference between the various Bactoferms (LHP, F-RM and M-EK)?
• My fermented sausages taste funny: do I have to use a starter culture?
• What role do sugars play in dry-curing sausages?
• What size casings should I use for Coppa?
• What is the secret to Armandino Batali's guanciale?
• My dry cured salame never firmed up and looks weird, what's going on?
• My house is cold, where can I incubate my salame?
• I added M-EK-4 to the outside of my salame, and now I've got hairy white mold: what do I do?
• Can I use cheap supermarket pork for dry-curing whole muscles?
• Do I really have to let stuff dry for months on end?
• My ham still seems raw inside, what did I do wrong?

Equipment FAQs

• Should I use a PID controller in my homebrew curing/smoking chamber?
• What is the best way to use the KitchenAid stuffing attachment?
• What do kids think about the KitchenAid stuffer?
• What do I do with the little plastic thingy that came with the KitchenAid stuffing attachment?
• Five pounds of sausage doesn't fit in my stand mixer bowl, what do I do?
• Do I really need one of those expensive hygrometers for dry curing?
• How can I humidify my curing chamber using a humidifier?
• How do I use a salt-water solution to control humidity in my curing chamber? See also this.
• Should I lube up my sausage stuffer?
• Can I use a FoodSaver to cure my bacon?
• Do I need a fan in my curing chamber?

Mold FAQs

• Is there any way to save my sausage with the fuzzy green mold?
• I just panicked and wipe off some of the good white mold: did I hurt anything?
• What does the good mold look like? See also this.
• Can I use a cheese rind mold to inoculate the outside of my dry-cured sausages?
• What does the bad mold look like?

Smoking FAQs

• Isn't bacon supposed to be cold smoked?
• What temperature does smoke absorption stop at?
• What kind of wood should I use to smoke?
• Can I hot- and cold-smoke at the same time with my homebrew smoking rig?

Misc. FAQs

• Is it really worth doing this at home? Don't I need an advanced degree or something?
• What is a good online source for sodium nitrite/nitrate/pink salt?
• Where can I get cheap pork back fat?
• How do I "harvest" the coppa from the shoulder?
• What do I do with a broken terrine?
• What's a good way to weigh down my pâté?
• Is "pork back fat" the same thing as "fatback"?
• How long can I freeze fatback?
• How long does fatback keep in the refrigerator?
• What do the jowl glands look like?
• Can I use wild hogs to do this stuff?
• What temperature do I need to reach to destroy butulism-related organisms/toxins?
• When do I need to use Nitrites and/or Nitrates?
• What are the nitrite concentrations in D.Q. Curing Salt #1 and #2?
• What is the UK equivalent to "Pink Salt"?
• How long does duck fat keep?
• Can I make any of this stuff Kosher?

Miscellaneous Information

• Other useful books
• Homebrew curing box
• Tips for using the KitchenAid grinder
• Improvised hot-plate smoker
• Ideal curing chamber suggestions
• Humidity explanation
• Improvised cold-smoker setup
• Grinder analysis
• Curing a country-style ham
• Improvised cold smoker
• Prescribed treatment of pork and products containing pork to destroy trichinae.
• Brine Calculations

Table of Contents (with links to a few detailed posts)

NOTE ABOUT POST SELECTION: The most appropriate post from the original topic was chosen to represent each recipe. Criteria for selection: 1) Includes photos, 2) is a recipe from Charcuterie with only minor modifications, and 3) is well-documented. Nominations for recipe analysis posts (from either the original topic or the new one) should be PM'ed to Chris Hennes or any other Kitchen Forum host.

1. Introduction

2. Recipes for Salt-Cured Food

• Fresh bacon (p. 41)
• Pancetta (finished product) (p. 44)
• Guanciale (p. 47)
• Salt Pork (p. 48)
• Salt Cod (p. 49)
• Fennel-cured salmon (finished product) (p. 50)
• Duck prosciutto (p. 54)
• Beef jerky (p. 55)
• Lemon Confit (p. 56)
• Herb-brined roasted chicken (p. 63)
• Garlic-sage-brined pork chops (p. 65)
• Corned beef (p. 67)
• The Natural Pickle (p. 69)
• Traditional dill pickles (p. 71)
• Home-cured sauerkraut (p. 72)

3. Recipes for Smoked Food

• Herb-brined smoked turkey breast (p.80)
• Whiskey-glazed smoked chicken (p. 81)
• Hot-smoked duck ham (p. 82)
• Maple-cured smoked bacon (p. 83)
• Smoked ham hocks (p. 85)
• Tasso ham (p. 86)
• Canadian bacon (p. 88)
• Spicy-smoke-roasted port loin (p. 89)
• Pastrami (p. 91)
• Carolina-style smoked barbeque (p. 92)
• American-style brown-sugar-glazed holiday ham (p. 93)
• Smoked jalapeños (p. 94)
• Spicy smoked almonds (p. 95)
• Smoked salmon (p. 96)
• Smoked scallops (p. 97)

4. Sausages

• Garlic sausage (p. 117)
• Kielbasa with marjoram (p. 118)
• Breakfast sausage (p. 120)
• Bratwurst (p. 121)
• Italian sausage (p. 122)
• Chicken sausage with basil and tomatoes (p. 124)
• Duck, sage and roasted garlic sausage (p. 125)
• Mexican chorizo (p. 127)
• Merguez (p. 129)
• Spicy roasted poblano sausage (p. 131)
• Turkey Sausage with Dried Tart Cherries (p. 132)
• Weiswurst (p. 140)
• Mortadella (p. 142)
• Boudin Blanc (p. 143)
• Boudin Noir (finished product) (p. 145)
• Shrimp, lobster and leek sausage (p. 147)
• Foie Gras and sweetbread sausage (p. 149)
• Braised sweetbreads (p. 150)
• Knackwurst (p. 153)
• Jagerwurst (p. 155)
• Smoked Andouille (p. 156)
• Venison Sausage (p. 157)
• Summer Sausage (p. 159)
• Thuringer (p. 160)
• Smoked chicken and roasted garlic sausage (p. 162)
• Kielbasa (p. 163)
• Hot dogs (p. 164)
• Hungarian paprika sausage (p. 166)
• Cold-smoked andouille (finished product) (p. 167)
• Cold-smoked chorizo (finished product) (p. 169)

5. Recipes for Dry-Cured Food

• Tuscan salami (p. 183)
• Peperone (finished product) (p. 185)
• Sopressata (finished product) (p. 186)
• Coppa (p. 188)
• Spanish chorizo (p. 190)
• Hungarian salami (p. 191)
• Sucisson Sec (p. 193)
• Landjager (p. 194)
• Salted air-dried ham (p. 197)
• Blackstrap Molasses Country Ham (p. 198)
• Bresaola (finished product) (p. 200)
• Lardo and Cured pork belly (p. 201)

6. Pâtés and Terrines

• Pâté de Campagne (p. 213)
• Pâté Gradmère (p. 214)
• English Pork Pie (p. 217)
• Pork Terrine with Pork Tenderloin Inlay (p. 219) 1
• Venison Terrine with Dried Cherries (p. 221)
• Chicken Galantine (p. 223)
• Roasted Duck Roulade ( finished product) (p. 229)
• Pork Pâté en Croûte (p. 231)
• Veal Terrine Gratin (p. 237)
• Shrimp and Salmon Terrine with Spinach and Mushrooms (p. 239)
• Maryland Crab, Scallop, and Saffron Terrine (p. 241)
• Salmon Pâté in Basil Cornmeal Crust (p. 242)
• Grilled Vegetable Terrine with Goat Cheese (p. 247)
• Avocado and Artichoke Terrine with Poached Chicken (p. 250)
• Headcheese (p. 253)

7. The Confit Technique

• Duck confit with clove (p. 259)
• Duck confit with star anise and ginger (p. 261)
• Goose confit (p. 261)
• Pork confit (p. 263)
• Pork belly confit (p. 264)
• Classic pork rillettes (p. 267)
• Smoked trout rillettes (p. 269)
• Mediteranean olive and vegetable rillettes (p. 270)
• Rillettes from confit (p. 272)
• Onion confit (p. 273)
• Tomato confit (p. 274)

8. Recipes to Accompany Charcuterie

• Basic Mayonnaise (p. 277)
• Aïoli (p. 278)
• Rémoulade (p. 279)
• Sauce Gribiche (p. 280)
• Cucumber Dill Relish (p. 281)
• Smoked Tomato and Corn Salsa (p. 282)
• Tart Cherry Mustard (p. 283)
• Green Chile Mustard (p. 284)
• Caraway-Beer Mustard (p. 284)
• Basic Vinaigrette (p. 285)
• Russian Dressing (p. 287)
• Chipotle Barbeque Sauce (p. 287)
• Carolina-Style Barbecue Sauce (p. 288)
• Cumberland Sauce (p. 289)
• Orange-Ginger Sauce (p. 290)
• Horseradish Cream Sauce (p. 290)
• Basil Cream Sauce (p. 291)
• Spicy Tomato Chutney (p. 292)
• Corn Relish (p. 293)
• Green Tomato Relish (p. 294)
• Onion-Raisin Chutney (p. 295)
• Bourbon Glaze (p. 295)
• Marinated Olives (p. 296)
• German Potato Salad (p. 297)
• Sweet Pickle Chips (p. 298)