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To Make Brine for Salting Meat

A brine made of salt, saltpetre, sugar, and water for salting meat.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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To Make Brine for Salting Meat

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the brine

  1. Mix salt, saltpetre, soft sugar, and water together well.

Cure the meat

  1. Submerge the meat in the brine, ensuring it is fully covered.

  2. Let the meat sit in the brine for 4 to 8 days, depending on desired saltiness.

  3. For pickling hams and tongues, add 12 pounded cochineal grains to the brine for color.

Maintain the brine

  1. Check the brine regularly; if it smells sour or offensive, boil it and skim off impurities.

  2. Allow the brine to cool before reusing.

  3. Do not boil it more than twice; make fresh brine afterward.

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

What each ingredient does

Salt
Draws moisture out of the meat, seasons it, and helps preserve it.
Saltpetre
Helps the meat keep a pink cured color and adds to its preservation.
Soft sugar
Softens the harshness of the salt and adds mild sweetness.

The step that matters

Do not reuse the brine too often. Repeated boiling and reuse lets impurities and spoilage build up, so making fresh brine after two boils keeps the meat safe and well cured.

“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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