jmolinari

I wonder if sous vide could come in handy here...

Prawn: i don't think you can buychicken fat. I have a bunch from when i made a lot of stock. But if i HAD to i'd use peanut oil.

Mostly the flavor. It is mapley and honey-y without being outright sweet. It's some tasty stuff!

I love chicken and rice. How do you make your rice Prawncrackers? I usually fry some garlic in some chicken fat, then toast the rice a little bit, and then add broth to my rice cooker and cook it. jason

Anyone have any ideas where to begin? I'd like to create a turkey breast like Boar's Head honey maple turkey at home, using a whole turkey breast instead of their processed stuff. any ideas welcome. Not sure where to start even. jason

Ce'Nedra - i also love the chewy tapioca noodles. Where did you get the recipe, or could you tell us one? thanks!

Sounds like a smoked pancetta. Bet its real tasty!

I would definitely salt cure it before drying, it needs time for the salt/cure to penetrate the meat. As for casing, i would use a collagen casing, 90 or 100mm should work well. It will slow the drying, but that is a good thing. I believe that the slower the drying (without allowing it to rot!), the better the flavor developed. I made a bresaola once without a casing and it came out quite well, but i preferred the ones with a casing. The latest coppa i made took 60 days to dry, and it is better than the ones i've made in the past which took about 30-40 days. I changed the drying time by holding the humidity at about 70% instead of my usual 60%.

i was gonna say the Mazzer mini. It is quite a bit quieter than my Rocky.

I think frozen after poaching for boudin noir. Before poaching it is really squishy and soft and i'd be afraid it'll leak blood all over!

People still watch FoodTV? Hrm.

The few times i used it i just stretched it over the bresaola/coppa. I didn't really find any use for it though. So i just use butcher's knots know along the length of the product.

thetwood, i've used those nettings, and haven't cleaned them, before you. Haven't had any problems.

Jon, no i didn't follow the recipe from the book. As i've said before, i don't know why the recipe in the book calls for chunks of shoulder. That isn't what coppa is. I hope there is an error correction in the next edition. You can see my blog for how to butcher a coppa from a shoulder. Oh, the casing i use is 100mm. jason

It may be a white-balance issue with the camera or the lighting, there isn't any yellowness at the center. Also though, a commerical chunk of cured meat i got from Italy, using a hunk of pork leg, has a central chunk of fat that is bright yellow. I've been eating it no problem. I don't know what the chemistry behind the yellowing is.

I just finished up a nice coppa. A bit too clove-y, but still rather tasty!

i'd go kitchenaid. It is inexpensive, and works quite well, as long as the meat is fairly sinew free and very cold. It does suck htat the KA doesn't have any alternate plate sizes That's just me though. I never liked my small hand crank one.

Wow. New studies show nitrates and nitrites are actually GOOD for you being cardioprotective, and have no studies showing links with cancer. therefore... EAT MORE CURED MEATS! or leafy vegetables http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/...71112172140.htm

I think i posted that method? I said 3 months b/c that is what i was told by an italian fellow:) I will warn you, that batch came out a little salty. I'm trying to figure out how to make make it less salty.

Disagree. In fact, in 18 years of living in Italy i never once saw a cannelloni that was like a pinwheel that you describe, but that may be because of where i'm from (north italy) In Piemonte, where my cousin (who makes the best cannelloni EVER) has a rosticceria (a sort of mostly-made, take home food business), it is tubes of pasta stuffed with roasted veal, pork and beef and vegetables which has been ground with herbs/spices and parmiggiano, and then baked with tomato sauce and besciamella. I guess my point is, in Piemonte at least, the traditional cannelloni ARE tube of pasta with filling. jason

I've had tremendously good pork from a guy in N. Carolina: cawcawcreek.com It is truely spectacular. I need to try some of the heritage pork. I do have a lot of Tamworth pork in my freezer from a different farmer here in Georgia, so that is the next comparison i'm going to run. I also did a head to head making salame with a local Georgia (not the n.Carolina guy) raised berk. and Costco pork. The results are interesting. You can find details on my blog: Making the salami: Cured meats - farmer vs. costco salame and the results: Cured meats - farmer vs. costco results Basically, i made a very simple salame, using just salt, pepper, garlic, meat and fat, and starter culture. I made 2 batches, one using the local farmer pork, the other using costco pork. Everything else was held the same. Ratios, fermentation times, etc.etc. I believe because of the higher intramuscular fat content of the farmer pork, those salami took longer to lose the same % of water by weight. What was most astonishing, was that the flavor was preferred by 5 out of 5 people tasting it blind. The farmer pork had a more distinct sour flavor, and the texture wasn't as nice as the commercial pork. Again, i attribute this to the intramuscular fat. If you've ever eaten a farmer pork chop against a commercial pork chop, you can tell the difference immediately in flavor. The farmer pork is just much porkier. I was expecting that to be even further enhanced by the drying. Instead, the flavors, other than the more sour note, were essentially identical. My conclusion is actually to attribute this to the farmer. Just because a farmer raises berkshire hogs, doesn't mean they'll come out spectacularly tasting...raising is as important as the breed. So i need to try pork from a different supplier (which have in my freezer), and re-run the test. jason

I normally use super H, and shop carefully, b/c as you said, many times the fish are WAY past their prime.

short ribs, pork belly, chicken breast

The texture is also a little bit of a personal preference. You could slice into one and try it. Also, in a regular fridge they'll dry out pretty quickly, as it is only about 20% humidity in there.

Chris, if you do try that box, remember there is no humidity control, and it is also quite small i think, but it might be worth it for small batches. Also, the time it takes the meat to dry will be very dependent on your humidity levels, temperatures, fat content of meat, air circulation, and thickness. So, it can vary a lot. QRN: From my reading, learning and talking to people 60 seems to me to be the upper limit. I'm thinking 65 is definitely too high, but Len Poli knows his stuff, so i may be in the wrong here. I cure all my stuff at about 54-57, but that's just me.