Massive Curing salt over dose!

[servantinsonora]

My wife made up a batch of brine yesterday while I was at work. I put A cut of pork in when I got home. Today I was walking past the cabinet and noticed that the bottle of insta cure was almost empty. She had mixed up 3 gallons. I asked how she measured the insta cure and she said she did one heaping measuring cup thinking that there were 8 oz in a cup, which there are by volume but not by weight which is what the recipe she was referencing was using. (She should have used 2 1/4 teaspoons!) so my question is: is the meat safe to eat if I take it out and mix up a new batch of cure?

I see quite a few articles about over doses and The general idea seems to be that is not a big deal as long as it doesn’t taste too salty but I don’t see anything of this scale either. I’m guessing this isn’t any different but I feel like it’s probably worth double checking.

thanks for the help

 

[indaswamp]

How much does the piece of meat weigh? We need to know this to help you.

 

[indaswamp]

This ought to help you:
https://www.smokingmeatforums.com/threads/digging-dog-cure-calculator.325813/

 

[servantinsonora]

I

How much does the piece of meat weigh? We need to know this to help you.

This ought to help you:
https://www.smokingmeatforums.com/threads/digging-dog-cure-calculator.325813/

thanks, I think I got it figured out…i think I’m just too tired. lol

 

[SmokinEdge]

My wife made up a batch of brine yesterday while I was at work. I put A cut of pork in when I got home. Today I was walking past the cabinet and noticed that the bottle of insta cure was almost empty. She had mixed up 3 gallons. I asked how she measured the insta cure and she said she did one heaping measuring cup thinking that there were 8 oz in a cup, which there are by volume but not by weight which is what the recipe she was referencing was using. (She should have used 2 1/4 teaspoons!) so my question is: is the meat safe to eat if I take it out and mix up a new batch of cure?

I see quite a few articles about over doses and The general idea seems to be that is not a big deal as long as it doesn’t taste too salty but I don’t see anything of this scale either. I’m guessing this isn’t any different but I feel like it’s probably worth double checking.

thanks for the help

We kinda need to know meat weight, but at minimum you would need 1 heaped Table spoon of cure for every gallon, not teaspoons. More info and we can help.

 

[forktender]

I wouldn't eat it, pork is relatively inexpensive, "relatively" LOL, nothing is inexpensive these days.

 

[jcam222]

This ought to help you:
https://www.smokingmeatforums.com/threads/digging-dog-cure-calculator.325813/

They put a whole cup of cure in 3 gallons of water vs 2 1/2 teaspoons. I think that Is over 20 times to much?

 

[indaswamp]

I


thanks, I think I got it figured out…i think I’m just too tired. lol

Right...

Well, here's what I would do. Let's call 1 heaping cup equal to 1 1/4 cups. So That would be 20 TBSPS cure #1.

3 gallons of water X 16 cups = 48 cups water.

Take 48 cups and divide by 20 TBSPS cure = 2.4 cups of cure solution contains 1 TBSP, cure #1...so....

2.4 cups cure solution x 3 = 7.2 cups cure solution to equal 3 TBSPS. cure #1....

I'd pull out 7.2 cups of cure solution, reserve that and set aside. Dump the rest of the cure solution, then pour the 7.2 cups reserved cure solution back into the bucket and add 40.8 cups of water....along with 1.5% salt for the weight of the water and the meat. That'll fix this problem......

 

[servantinsonora]

So now that I’m awake this is what I’m seeing:

Insta Cure says 20 tsp of their pink salt = 4 oz.

therefore: 5tsp = 1 oz.

instaCure also recommends using 3 oz of pink salt per gallon of water for making a basic brine.

therfore: there should be 15 tsp of pink salt per gallon. There are 45 tsp in a cup. So 45 tsp is what should have been used according to InstaCure.

If as Indaswamp is assuming 1 “heaping cup” = 1.25 cups that would mean that there were 59 tsp total pink salt in three gallons of water or: about 19 tsp per gallon. (About 6.3 tablespoons per gallon for anyone more accustomed to using that measurement)

i understand that there are other factors to consider but at this point it seems like biased on InstaCure’s recommendations the pink salt might be a bit high bit probably not high enough to be a major problem.

am I thinking this through correctly now that I’m awake?

 

[dr k]

Dump it and start over. 4.17lbs./half gallon water. Measure half gallons to cover meat. Add weight of meat to weight of water and convert to grams. Multiply total grams by .0025 (.25%) for grams of cure #1. If three gallons of water is needed to cover 20lbs. of meat, then that would be 51 grams cure #1. That's closer to three Tablespoons cure #1. I'd go by weight vs imperial volume measurements.

 

[Smoke-Chem BBQ]

I asked how she measured the insta cure and she said she did one heaping measuring cup thinking that there were 8 oz in a cup, which there are by volume but not by weight

Yet another reason that I really hate the Imperial system of measurement. It's such a cobbled-together, anachronistic, illogical collection of measurements.

 

[SmokinEdge]

So now that I’m awake this is what I’m seeing:

Insta Cure says 20 tsp of their pink salt = 4 oz.

therefore: 5tsp = 1 oz.

instaCure also recommends using 3 oz of pink salt per gallon of water for making a basic brine.

therfore: there should be 15 tsp of pink salt per gallon. There are 45 tsp in a cup. So 45 tsp is what should have been used according to InstaCure.

If as Indaswamp is assuming 1 “heaping cup” = 1.25 cups that would mean that there were 59 tsp total pink salt in three gallons of water or: about 19 tsp per gallon. (About 6.3 tablespoons per gallon for anyone more accustomed to using that measurement)

i understand that there are other factors to consider but at this point it seems like biased on InstaCure’s recommendations the pink salt might be a bit high bit probably not high enough to be a major problem.

am I thinking this through correctly now that I’m awake?

Never be cavalier when measuring cure #1, it’s a big reason why large amounts of cure #1 should always be weighed and never measured with cups, spoons or buckets.

let me explain. The strongest brine mix with cure #1 allowed by the USDA is 1970 parts per million (ppm) of nitrite. This brine is for injection only at 10% of meat weight, this imparts 197ppm nitrite to the meat and is just under the maximum in going nitrite to whole muscle at 200ppm.

Now, let’s do the math on your brine with 3 gallons water and assuming 1-1/4 cups of cure #1.
I weighed this out with my cups which might be slightly different than your cups, cups and spoon volume vary by manufacture.

Solve for nitrite ppm in 3 gallons water (water weighs 3781.82g per gallon)

We will first solve the amount of nitrite in 1-1/4c cure #1, by multiplying the weight of the cure #1 by 6.25% nitrite thats in cure #1

357.66 x .0625= 22.35 (this is the gram amount of pure nitrite in 1-1/4 cups of cure1.
we will multiply that by 1 million
22.35 x 1000000= 22350000
Now we divide that number by the weight of 3 gallons water to get ppm nitrite in brine.
22350000/1134.46= 1970 Ppm nitrite

EDIT for correction.

 

[SmokinEdge]

By the way, 1 heaping Table spoon of cure 1 in a gallon of water will get you 429.6 ppm nitrite in brine.