Thanks ;)
I will give you the short answer, "for those who cannot ferment at controlled temps and humidity": use a meat culture, and ferment at what you can. Fermento isn't a culture. Now the details to explain why!
Fermento. While I actually do bacteria cultures and ferments, I am ALSO a fan of chemical acidification. The problem with chemical acidification is that any fast and large pH changes, such as 0.1 pH drop over a 10 min period or less, create protein changes that are not desireable. Basically the meat gets crumbly and mushy, and is always rejected by taste testers. I have read numerous meat science studies on direct chemical acidification, of which 5 or 6 were good info. Commercial producers would love to just dump in acid instead of dealing with fermenting... but they can't. To get enough pH drop to protect meat, or give expected acid flavors, requires numerous expensive and time consuming small acid injections, to let protein chains gradually react, remain intact, and not become crumbly and mushy. In all the studies I read, the final analysis has been that just dumping in bacteria cultures once and fermenting for 12-18 hours was almost always cheaper.
So, direct chemical acidification. One most common method today, is to add Lactic acid ( end result of fermenting) or Citric acid (common, cheaper and more tart replacement) that has been ENCAPSULATED with a palm oil coating. This is supposed to protect meat from the acid until after 135f or so, when the palm oil encapsulation melts, and the meat proteins have ALREADY been "cooked" and denatured, so the acid no longer makes the meat crumbly or mushy.
The other common method is to add GDL, which apparently slowly converts to acid under heat or time and acidifies the meat slowly enough to not break up the protein chains.
Fermento was an old method to artificially acidify stuff. IT WASN'T ENOUGH ACID TO JUST BE DONE! It was used to bump pH down a little, thus providing a tiny bit more protection to fermenting meat that then underwent a wild ferment! Most meat pathogens do worse in low pH than Lactic Acid Bacteria, so slightly lowering the pH gave you a chance for decent bacteria to get going instead of listeria etc. But read the Kutas recipes, you have to be clear that Fermento wasn't just added and then BAM, smoke it! No, the meat is always then just left out at room temperatures WELL EXCEEDING the FDA pathogen growth "Come Up Time" or CUT limit, of 6 hrs between 40-130F. This is because all his recipes rely on a WILD FERMENT happening during these rest times! So you can't just talk about Fermento as an ingredient replacing ECA in your summer sausage, you must always talk about "FERMENTO PLUS A WILD FERMENT"!
Lets take a look at the first 4 recipes Kutas has in his book that use Fermento, and I'm just stopping there because I don't want to go on forever:
1. Pg 343, summer sauusage. 9 hrs rest or smoke below 120F, then probably 2-3 more at 165 until IT exceeds 130. So likely 12-15 hrs in the ferment zone! And 3.75% fermento, that's a LOT of dried yogurt to dump in a sausage!
2. Slim jims, pg 345, 20 hrs hanging at 98-110F fermentation temps! 3.75% fermento.
3. Lebanon bologna pg 346, 50 hrs hanging at 90-110f or below! 3.75% fermento.
4. Thuringer, pg 347, 3.75% fermento. 35 hours between 65f and 110f!
Etc. and on and on for every recipe, they ALL ARE WILD FERMENTED!
FERMENTO was originally just cultured whey and skim milk, heat treated to no longer be biologically active... so dried out tangy yogurt! I constantly see people say it is an active culture, IT IS NOT. Current "Fermento" can contain other stuff such as dextrose, glucose solids, sodium erythorbate and ascorbic acid accelerators. The difference in adding Fermento vs pure citric/lactic acid, is the acid is weaker and mixed with the milk solids, where the bonds keep it from just immediately migrating to the meat proteins and breaking them apart. So it is KIND OF SAFE for texture changes. Maybe. If you don't use too much, or mix it too hard with meat or with too much water to free up the chemicals etc. But still not as good as current favorites Encapsulated Citric or Lactic Acid, or GDL.
Remember, all acid is just free hydrogen ions zipping around without an electron, massively reactive and just looking to grab onto anything, breaking molecules up to grab an electron. So slightly acidic dried yogurt is nowhere near as reactive as a real acid like citric, where the ions are just waiting for water to free them.
The H in Fermento is already grabbing milk proteins, so the meat proteins aren't a significantly more attractive target for the H, which is why you can get a bit of pH drop using it, without hacking up the meat texture.
Why is Fermento use all over then? Put yourself in 1985! It was dried yogurt, and was available! There was no
Amazon, no online market, no internet to research all this stuff, no books on it, no ability to find a chemical company like BalChem who makes this stuff, no way to know their phone# or even nname.There was no Chr. Hansen Bactoferm meat cultures. Unless you were the Meat Science PhD for Hormel, you never heard of any of this, nor GDL etc! I've beem trying to source ELA from BalChem for a year now, I have all their internet product booklets and MSDS and safety sheets, online email and phone contacts, and have been in touch with company reps 20 times going through their various melt points and coating formulations, and my Dad was President of the 3rd largest flavors and frangrances company in the world and has helped... I still don't have any ELA despite this! Now time travel back to 1985 and try to put together some sausage ingredients as a poor dude writing his first home sausage book...
So, I don't hate Fermento, but I do strongly dislike Wild Ferments, which is what using Fermento really means! There is just no reason to subject your expensive meat and 3 months of effort on a wild ferment anymore. If it is all you can find, then fine... but if you're using it because it is a listed ingredient in Kutas' book, then I'm gonna say there are 4 easier, cheaper, better products out there: ECA, "smooth acid" ECA/ELA blend, GDL, and meat cultures.
Hope that is informative and helpful. I DO love Kutas' book, I bought 2 copies and always reference the recipes for spicing. He did a great job bringing sausage making to us all. Disliking wild ferments and fermento is NOT equal to disrespecting Kutas ;)
