Too much Prague #1??

[Toneill25]

While following a recipe, we accidentally substituted Prague #1 instead of Tender Quick... ended up adding half a cup of #1 for 6 pounds of beef brisket. It’s been curing in the fridge for 9 days now, and we just realized our error. Is the meat garbage? Help!

 

[chef jimmyj]

I would toss the meat. While you may be able to soak out a great deal of the Cure #1, you have no way to tell if you are still at Toxic levels, as you are now. A 6 pound Brisket is not likely to break the bank. The Hospital Bills will...JJ

 

[sawhorseray]

You'd best take Chef Jimmy's advise and toss that hunk of meat, about a teaspoon would have done you. And don't let it get to where a dog can find it! RAY

 

[pops6927]

Were you wet curing or dry curing? Did you add water into the mix? If you added 3 gallons of water, then you would be ok - 8 oz. of cure #1 to 3 gallons would be 2.65 oz. per gallon, within acceptable levels (3.84 oz. per gallon max.). If dry cure, it would be way out of wack, and toss it!

 

[Toneill25]

It was part of a dry rub.

 

[daveomak]

1/2 cup of Cure#1 weighs in at ~133 grams... I just weighed of 1/2 cup of cure#1...

Considering a 6# hunk of meat safely needs ~8.7 grams of cure#1 (according to the USDA maximum allowable) for 200 Ppm nitrite dry rub, that hunk of meat could be about 3,000 Ppm nitrite...

Acute toxicity
LD50 Oral-Rat-157.9 mg/kg(Sodium nitrite)
LD50 Oral-Mouse-175 mg/kg(Sodium nitrite)

Pigs toxicity...
150 grams of bait at 10% nitrite... 100% lethality..... will kill a 70# feral pig

 

[sawhorseray]

It was part of a dry rub.

Well what the heck, a darned good thing you signed up and asked I'd think. Welcome to SMF from Gilbert, AZ! A lot of friendly folks here with a wealth of knowledge to share. RAY

 

[chef jimmyj]

You might want to keep TQ and Cure #1 in separate cabinets. Sorry to give bad news...JJ