Jewish Chorizo?

Jewish Chorizo?

So why did I call this Jewish Chorizo? First, you have to understand two things about Chorizo and Treif. Chorizo is traditionally made from pork, and Treif is all food that is un-kosher or in laymen's terms unfit for consumption. Also, since I am Jewish and the author of this recipe, I thought it was a catchy title.

  

I will briefly describe what Chorizo is and what my plans are for this Salumi. Chorizo is from the Iberian Peninsula and mostly associated with the Spanish culture. It can be made with several varieties of meat, but predominately it is made from pork. It's a very spicy Salumi/Sausage that can be prepared in several ways. I chose to dry-cure my Salumi instead of the fresh variety. Fresh Chorizo is OK, but the dry-cured version is the bomb in my not so humble opinion. 

How do you make Dry-cured Salamis? Well, this is my first attempt. I have made plenty of fresh sausages in my time and even the smoked versions requiring Prague Power #1 but never this type of Sausage or Salumi. I consulted many blogs and several books to help with science. The recipe is all mine and with my own spin. 

Essential steps in Making your Salumi

The first thing you need to do is choose your meat. I chose boneless short ribs, and for the extra fat, I needed I decided on the brisket.

I kept the meat extremely cold, which makes it easier to cut. I cut the meat into one-inch pieces than partially freeze the meat, which makes it easier to grind.   

After the meat is ground up, I give it a quick toss to incorporate the two types of meat than place the meat back into the refrigerator to push temp below 37 degrees. It's important to keep meat out of the danger zone at all times, which is 40-140 degrees.  

I pre-measured all ingredients, including Prague powder #2, using Milligram scales or this Milligram scale. These scales are not expensive, either so pick one up. 

Note 1: The weight of meat plus fat is 100%. All ingredients to be added are expressed as a percentage of the weight of meat plus fat. Percentages can be used to standardize recipes regardless of batch size.  All weights are metric.

Note 2: No weights are given because the weights of meats vary. Everything is a percentage of the weight of the meat after trimming. Example- Meat weight 2393 grams, and we want to find out the amount of salt we need in grams- 2393 X 3.5%=83.755 or 2392/100 X 3.5 =83.755 grams. 

After the meat temp has come down a bit, I mix all the ingredients except for the Culture. I mix the meat quite aggressively to ensure the incorporation of all ingredients. I then add diluted culture to the meat and knead the meat until firm and everything is thoroughly mixed. 

I used a Sausage Maker Stuffer as my stuffing apparatus. It's a great inexpensive little stuffer that gets the job done. I have had mine for about 15 yrs. 

Now on to the bags. Since I do not have a traditional curing chamber, I am once again using a UMAI dry bag for my Charcuterie.

After three days of fermenting, the Chorizo is now ready for the cooler. The Chorizo will lose 30% of their weight. 

After 7 days, the Chorizo lost 17% of its weight. Looks great. 

I wrote about my desire to make a Chorizo without Treif, and I am happy to report that I completed my project, and it came out great!!!  

Look at these pictures!!! Outstanding looking Chorizo if I do say so my self!!!

 After a long wait of only 24 days, the Chorizo lost 30% of its weight.  I used the UMAI drybags to tackle the boundaries of Charcuterie. 

As you can tell from the photos, these bags allowed me to make excellent charcuterie!!!!

Next Batch will be bigger and spicier!!