Salami Failures....and Why.

[indaswamp]

Time to be humble....

I started off with great success in my journey into crafting salami 2 years ago. Made about a 12-16 different salamis with very few failures. Well, I have been dialing my new chamber in over the last year. Had too much airflow so I made a restriction plate out of an HDPE flexible cutting board. Cut the flow back to about 65%. So now air flow should be good. My salamis were drying, but more dry rim than I'd like. I also started a culatello not long after I got my new chamber up and running after the old one crapped out on me. May have some case hardening, but it is still losing weight so guess I will find out when I cut into it. We will see if it survived hanging in a regular fridge with intermittent electricity for 10 days during the aftermath of Hurricane Ida. If I lose that piece, it is a small price to pay as there are a lot of people across South Louisiana that lost everything. Last salamis I made, I had been focused on the optimum drying parameters for the Culatello and I had bumped the temp. in my chamber up to 53-60*F in order to speed up the proteolysis and lipolysis within the Culatello. I was trying to mimic the summer fermentation period that happens naturally along the Po river valley in Italy. Well, when I made my last two salamis-I totally forgot I had bumped up the chamber temp. so when I hung them to dry in the chamber after fermentation the fermentation slowly continued. This dropped the pH below 4.7 and the salami was sour with no flavor development.
So many little things to be mindful of in this craft! And it ALL matters! I have 3.5Kg. class 1 lean pork shoulder trimmed and cut in a ziplock on ice now along with 1.5kg. pastured Berkshire back fat. I'll be redoing Finocchiona today.

The Culatello definitely achieved a secondary fermentation as the ammonia smell got strong in the chamber. I have lowered chamber temp. down 5*F, and now have a thermometer with a probe in a 16oz. water bottle hanging to monitor internal temp. of salami hanging in the chamber. It is now at 52*F so I should be good now as fermentation slows down exponentially below 53*F. Education continues......

 

[pineywoods]

Thanks for telling us about the bad I hope the Culatello survived and turns out well. It seems we usually see the good stuff but don't often here about the bad so it makes stuff look easier than it is I'm guessing. Does different stuff take different temps and humidity often or is there usually a middle ground that works for most things?

 

[indaswamp]

You will often see the 55*F; 80%RH posted. This works well for 'most' stuff and if you have a wide range of different stuff from medium diameter whole cuts, to small dia. salamini sticks, it will work. You might get a little dry rim on some stuff from drying too fast, but it is acceptable for most people as home producers. Optimization allow for perfect drying; tailoring the drying schedule to the product hanging. Large bone in hams with rind can be dried @70-75% RH where as culatello without rind or bone must be dried 88-90%RH for initial stages, 80-85% for mid stages, then 88-90% for final flavor development.

For salamis- grind size, diameter, percentage of fat, final pH, amount of salt....they all change the drying schedule slightly.

 

[indaswamp]

I've made mistakes figuring this craft out...



Keep on keepin on....

 

[indaswamp]

I have my chamber temp. range set at 48-55*F now and this has given an INT of 52.5*F inside the salamis. Fermentation has been halted. The Finocchiona pH is on a slight rise now, up from 5.07 to 5.18....perfect. So- if you suspect that fermentation might continue when you hang them in your chamber after fermentation, or if you suspect that all the sugars have not been used up to produce lactic acid (such is the case when using more than 10g./kg. of calabrian pepper powder) then you would do well to adjust your temps. down into this range.