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Preserve

Keeping Sausage Meats

A method for curing sausage meats using salt, saltpetre, sugar, and sweet pickle.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Meat and pork are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,208 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-one, which smells mushroom, metallic. The science ↓

Keeping Sausage Meats

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cure

  1. Thoroughly chill the sausage meats.

  2. Mix the salt, saltpetre, and sugar together.

Pack and seal

  1. Combine the mixture with the meats in a large container.

  2. Pack the meats tightly.

  3. Fill the container completely.

  4. Add the sweet pickle to the packed meats.

  5. Seal the container air-tight.

Cure and finish

  1. Cure the meats for 12 to 25 days, depending on the size of the pieces.

  2. Chop the meats to the desired consistency.

  3. Add flavoring ingredients.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

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

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Meat + porktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,208 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  2. Meat + sugartop 34% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,866 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Pork + sugartop 37% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,579 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Coarse sea salt
Draws out moisture and preserves the meat while it cures.
Saltpetre
Helps the meat keep its pink colour during the cure.
Sugar
Adds a mild sweetness and balances the saltiness of the cure.
Sweet pickle
Adds liquid and carries the cure evenly through the packed meat.

The step that matters

Seal the container air-tight. Air exposure lets the surface spoil and dry out during a long cure, while a sealed container keeps the meat moist and the cure working evenly through the pieces.

“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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