A Mild Ham Cure
Ingredients
Directions
Make the brine
Boil the water, salt, saltpeter, and sugar together.
Skim off any impurities that rise to the surface.
Cure the meat
Use this brine to cure approximately 295 lbs. of meat.
Ensure proper care and attention to the meats throughout the curing process.
Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.
Explore the science
What each ingredient does
- Coarse sea salt
- Draws moisture out of the meat and slows bacterial spoilage during curing.
- Saltpeter
- Helps preserve the meat's pink color and inhibits harmful bacteria during curing.
- Sugar
- Balances the harshness of the salt and adds a mild sweetness to the cured meat.
The step that matters
Skim off impurities while the brine boils. Impurities that rise to the surface can carry off-flavors and spoilage microbes into the brine, which then passes to the meat. Removing them keeps the cure clean and the flavor mild.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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