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Preserve

For Curing Meat

A method for preserving meat using salt, sugar, pepper, and saltpetre over several weeks.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and meat are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 19% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,777 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

For Curing Meat

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cure

  1. Mix the salt, brown sugar, black pepper, and saltpetre in a large tub.

  2. Rub the mixture thoroughly onto the meat.

Cure the meat

  1. Lay the meat on a plank and leave it for three weeks, or longer if the weather is very cold.

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. Pepper + meattop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,777 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Sugar + peppertop 32% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together19,401 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Sugar + meattop 34% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,866 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Sugar and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 19,401 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Coarse sea salt
Draws moisture out of the meat and slows bacterial spoilage.
Brown sugar
Balances the harshness of the salt and adds mild sweetness.
Saltpetre
Helps the meat keep its cured colour and further slows spoilage-causing bacteria.
Meat
The protein being preserved; the cure penetrates it slowly over the curing period.
Black pepper
Adds sharp aroma and flavour; it does not preserve the meat.

The step that matters

Rubbing the cure thoroughly onto the meat. Salt and curing salts only protect the parts they touch and penetrate slowly by diffusion. Thorough, even coverage ensures no area is left unprotected, where spoilage bacteria could grow during the long cure.

“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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