Despite already having thrown two parties devoted to enjoying our jamon serrano (see: http://www.meatclub.org/fiesta-de-jamon-serrano), and my daughter's and my devoted snacking, I still had the majority of the jamon untouched as of last week.  So, another party, with a lot of people, was required.  And so we had one this past weekend, filled with great food, great friends, and great weather.  Here are a few pictures of before and during the party (with a nice shot of Pepper, perhaps the jamon's greatest booster):

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After everyone left the party, I still had way more meat on the bone than I and my family could consume in the near future.  And, since the leg had already been cut open and at (cool) room temperature for over a month, I decided it was best to cut the remainder off the bone and put the best meat in the fridge for slicing up in upcoming weeks (months?), and save the lesser meat for braises, soups, etc.  Here are a few pictures of the final steps:

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It has been almost exactly 18 months since our prosciutto were born on the Big Pig Day in February, 2010.

Since Jamie recently harvested his own Jamon (not prosciutto) of a slightly longer age with a good deal of success, I deemed it was time to do the same with ours. They weighed in at 21.5 lbs. and 25 lbs. at harvest – essentially no weight change since late 2010. One difference is that his did not have lard layered on the cut end, and ours did.

Jamie chose the Jamon (Spanish) approach to harvesting his using the stand the I threw together from stuff in my shop. He did not have to worry about dividing his beast into shares – opting to consume it slowly (and sharing as he did) by carving thin slices along the way. I had to take the Italian route whereby deboning is done. The Italians usually then leave the deboned leg intact and slice it thinly across the grain of the meat for consumption. I had to divide these into shares.

I really had no idea how to proceed with deboning. Jamie provided me with some you tube links demonstrating the process:

YouTube - DISOSSATRICE PROSCIUTTO per APERTO

YouTube - Deboning Prosciutto

Looks simple and straight forward doesn’t it. Not having quite all the parts laying around in my shop to duplicate the device seen in the videos, I decided to wing it without one.

My first task of course was to remove the lard, and I decided to do this on the picnic table on our back deck. I spread an old bath towel on the table. This turned out to work quite well since it provided at large non-skid surface. Here is how they looked:

I first scraped the large amounts of lard off with my hands collecting it on paper towels. I actually though about saving some of it, but the outer layers of it appeared to be a little oxidized or rancid. It turns out that working out in the sun was a good idea as the heat loosened and liquefied the remaining lard which I removed with more paper towels and repeated wiping. It took at least 45 minutes to complete this whole process.

Here is how they looked at that point – a nice golden hue to them:

Closer views of the smaller one:

And the larger one:

Now to the deboning. I attacked the smaller one first by attempting to make a cut from the end of the femur bone sticking out in the cut end of the leg and following the bone down toward the shank. What I did not realize is that following that bone is not as easy as it sounds. Remember that there is a knee joint in there somewhere leading to another bone that comes out the shank end. So, after making a deep cut along the “bone line” and realizing I was no longer hitting bone, I tried spreading the cut open to see what was going on. No bone to be seen where I though it would be. I hacked around and found the bone again and eventually the knee/joint, and with more cutting was starting to get the femur to release from the meet and move in the joint. More cutting/hacking along the other bone (tibia-fibula?) coming out of the joint took place. It took me about 30-45 minutes before I finally got both of the bones out and ended up with two large pieces of meat – one in pretty good shape and the other rather hacked up and looking like this (bones in the background):

On to the other leg. This time I cut the main/larger half of the leg off straight away thinking I could at least preserve it fairly well leaving the other half with the bones in it to be hacked on resulting in two pieces looking like this after the bone removal – another 30 minutes at least (more bones in the background):

Here are closer looks at the two halves of the second and larger leg after deboning. First the half I cut away right off:

And the other half where the bones were:

At this point, I had been at it over two and half hours. I decided to put the cut halves back into the fridge where they had lived for 18 months and attack trimming and cutting into shares in the evening after dinner.

At least now I knew that there were no maggots or other signs of spoilage. Of course I had been tasting scraps resulting from the hacking. They were quite salty, but the underlying flavor was quite good. I knew that when chilled and thinly sliced we had a good product.

Here are the four halves on our kitchen counter that evening (color rendering under the fluorescent lights is not great):

And closer looks of the smaller leg:

And the larger leg:

I trimmed obviously unusable stuff (too dry or funky looking) and cut into pieces (essentially dividing each of these four longitudinally, then into smaller pieces) that could be divided for shares:

More cutting and dividing into shares by shape and weight as best possible to be equitable led to these piles:

And finally wrapped in heavy duty foil and back into the fridge in plastic bags/shares:

I tried to provide each share with one well blocked piece of meat easily suitable for a slicer and two more oddly shaped pieces. I forgot to weigh the net product result, but I estimate it to be between 30 and 35 lbs.  There was weight lost from the lard, bones, trim and just plain waste pieces. Keep in mind that the skin is still on. Before attempting any thin slicing either by hand or machine, trim some of the skin back from the edge of the side that is to be sliced – unless your really want to try eating it along with the slice.

I believe these prosciuttos are more moist that the jamon leg that Jaimie produced. Difference is probably attributable to the lard that was applied as advised way back when by an industry professional that shall remain nameless. In fact, some of you will notice that there are small portions of the blocked cuts (and others) that are not totally dried out or firm. I don’t think that means they are not cured. There is so much salt in this meat that it has to be cured. I doubt that aging for any more time would have made a difference since I could not detect any weight/water loss for many months. So, I am not sure about the wisdom of the lard application. Jamie’s leg had no lard on it, more weight loss, and turned out fine.

I sliced some of a blocked piece of meat on my deli slicer and served it with some Manchego cheese and some Manzanilla sherry before dinner last night. Even thinly sliced, this stuff is mighty salty, but enjoyable. I intend to try some of the oddly shaped stuff cut into small pieces in a frittata with some potatoes and mushrooms for breakfast Sunday morning to see how that works.

This brings to a close our prosciutto journey. Not sure that I would do this again if I ever had a leg at my disposal. A little of this product goes a long way.

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The prosciutto I've been curing for the last 18+ months rejected its Italian roots and found its true identity as a Spanish Jamon Serrano.  I expect the change was spurred by the fantastic jamon carving stand that Jim fashioned a few weeks ago -- even though Jim blasphemed and called it a prosciutto carving stand (see: http://www.meatclub.org/basic-prosciutto-carving-stand).

Regardless of terminology and nationality, it was clear that a party was in order.  So, I gathered with a handful of food-loving friends and family and we had a great Spanish-themed dinner on Saturday night with jamon, manchego, chorizo, and a fantastic paella (oh, and lots of wine and spanish cider -- see the last photo).  It was a great night.  

Here are a few pictures of the jamon carving in progress.

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It's now sitting on my kitchen counter at home, waiting for friends and neighbors to come by with a bottle of wine or sidra to partake.  Drop by....

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If you want to see a history of this ham/jamon/proscuitto, see:

http://www.meatclub.org/proscuitto-begins

http://www.meatclub.org/prosciutto-teaser

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Jamie is going to attack his prosciutto in the next couple of weeks. It has been aging/curing in Peter’s facilities for the last eighteen months or more. He is planning to use the Spanish method of putting it on a stand and carving off thin slices. He mentioned that he was going to shop around for a carving stand. I did some searching on the web and found several widely differing designs and examples of stands:

http://www.alibaba.com/product-free/110594887/wooden_ham_holder_Prosciutto_ham_holder/showimage.html

http://www.kitchencontraptions.com/archives/007981.php

http://www.hamstand.net/products.php

http://www.vallebona.co.uk/products/Prosciutto-Stand-%26-Knife.html

Some of these are VERY expensive – like $400 dollars.

The wooden examples in the first link above looked rather basic and pretty simple to construct if you have the materials and a few tools. So, I decided to make the the stand you see here:

with another view here:

and another view here:

The base of the stand is an old solid oak chopping block that we had laying around. It measures 20x9x2 inches and has four rubber feet on the bottom at the corners. The vertical piece of wood is another piece of solid oak and measures 12.5x5.75x.75 inches. I used a good circle cutter attachment on my drill press to cut a 4 inch diameter hole in one end and then used a band saw to complete the U shaped opening where the shank of the ham will go. The vertical piece of wood is attached to the base with four 3x3 inch corner irons – two on each side (staggered so that the screws from either side don’t smack into each other). The eye bolts in the vertical piece are to hold the shank of the ham. They are 1/4x20 bolts about 3 inches long. Not visible are two threaded brass inserts in the holes where the eye bolts go through the wood so that there is something for them to bite on. The round device on the surface of the base is a 2.5 inch hole saw that has had its back side (the side that normally goes toward the drill when it is mounted to make holes) cut off with a hack saw. I made four cuts about 3/8 inch deep in the base surface where the cutoff hole saw can be moved/adjusted to act as a non-slip grip on the bottom of the ham.

Here is a picture of Jamie’s baby mounted on the stand:

And another view longitudinally:

The ham seems stable enough to allow for carving with a good sharp knife. If it is not, I have a couple of ideas for additions to add stabilization.

I had most of the stuff in my precious piles of saved miscellany in my workshop (Can you say packrat?) – wood, corner irons, brass inserts. Just had to buy the eye bolts and the hole saw. The hardest part of the project was cutting the back off of the hole saw after making the four semi-holes in the top of the base. I went through a couple of hacksaw blades doing this.

It remains to be seen how well this will work. Jamie tells me he will probably attack a couple of weeks from now.

Stay tuned.

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It's been about a 18 months since we salted the prosciuitto described at:

http://www.meatclub.org/proscuitto-begins

Peter has been the custodian for the last year-and-a-half, so he'll have to chime in with any relevant details about the curing conditions.  But, as you can see below, the leg looks fantastic.  And, it smells amazing.  It lost around 44% of its weight.

I'll post more pictures and give more details when I cut into it and taste, but that may be a couple weeks, since I'm on my way out of town (and just sprained my ankle, so unable to wield the beastly hunk o' love with my crutches.).  But, I promise, more to come....

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It's been just over a month since the spanish chorizo went into the curing chamber (see last post).  Based on weight loss, firmness, and taste, I've concluded that they're done (except for the largest one, which I'm going to give another week or two). 

The pair of sausages in the hog casings (on the left in the first photo) lost 40% of the their weight, as did the smaller sausage in the beef-middle casing (in the center).  The largest one (on the right) lost 36% of its weight and still has a little "squish" to it when I squeeze, so I'm going to let it ride a little longer.  I'm also doing this because having cut open and tasted the small diameter sausages with 40% loss, I've found that they're still plenty moist to cut and in the mouth, so I'm not worried about letting the largest one lose more moisture weight.  Regarding curing chamber conditions, temperature hovered in the mid 50s and humidity started up around 80%+ and ramped down to 65%-70%.

As for flavor: fantastic!  Very rich, no off-flavors, good bind, and several layers of the various paprikas, garlic, etc.  These will be great on their own with a good beer (or perhaps some Asturian cider....) and also as an ingredient in cooking.  Of course, if Tim gets near, they may disappear quickly.

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I cranked out two batches of spanish chorizo this weekend -- one cured and one fresh.  Here they both are after stuffing (the batch of small links are the fresh, and the group of two large and one pair are for curing):

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I gave biltong a second try with a better cut of meat, in an attempt to make it more authentic (and tastier).  I used a 3-pound eye-of-round (same cut as often used for bresaola), and cut it into three 3/4" slabs running with the grain.

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Below are a couple of pictures of the completed Spicy Finocchiona (to see prior posts, click on tag on sidebar of "finocchiona").  The salami were done curing over a month ago, but I just never got around to posting. 

In all, these are the best salami I've yet made.  Good taste, good spice, and good texture.  One interesting thing was that I originally pulled them from the curing chamber when the weight loss was around 33-35%.  But, I felt that the one I cut into was still too mushy and unconsolidated, so I let them dry for another few weeks until the total weight lost was around 40%, which I think improved them.  Also, my fat content was a bit too high on these, so next time I'll fix the ratio.  But, in all, a solid success. 

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I used

http://lpoli.50webs.com/index_files/Snack%20Sticks.pdf

some random one online, and

http://events.nytimes.com/recipes/1884/2001/12/30/The-Original-Slim-Jim/recipe.html

This one, http://www.michigan-sportsman.com/forum/showthread.php?t=249097 looks the best, and from dudes who know what they are doing, but I don't want to use a store bought mix, but their methods look spot on.

I have not kept the type of meat constant, but I have kept the fat to meat ratio pretty even.

The first and second time I cleaned out the freezer and used lamb, veal, boar and duck, the second time I used only duck and boar. 
I have tried three different cooking methods.  I would use a smoker but I don't have a vertical smoker

First time, dehydrator, 36 hours, crumbly texture

Second time, oven (170 degrees for 6 hours), good sausage texture, but more like a sausage and less like a snack stick

Third time, (this recipe I used cure #1 and LHP starter culture and let cure at 90 degrees and 90% humidity for 24 hours then used the dehydrator for 12 hours, came out crumbly and nasty.

The smoker may be the only way to go, and I won't know until I get, or borrow a smoker from someone.
Every good stack stick I have had has been done in a smoker.

Has anyone done this before.

Also my prosciutto has been drying for 14 months now, should I bust it out or keep it there?

I also have a couple rabbits left if anyone wants one, or several for Xmas dinner, buy or trade

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Finocchiona are doing very well in the chamber, having been in for about three weeks. Temp has been 55-60 and humidity at 70-75%.

Below are paired pictures taken about a week ago and yesterday (each pair shows one side of the salumi). You can see the change in the plumpness. Here's one side, before and after (i.e., a week ago and yesterday):

And here's the other side:

 I'm also happy with the mold development.  There's a nice bloom of the mold I sprayed on and no visible bad molds. 

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I'm reluctant to post as I'll catch family flak from across the bay. But here goes...

The sweet italian Argentine swirl rested quietly in the freezer. Since July. Why so long? No good reason. It's November. Weather is good. Time to Q the swirl!

Jamie & family brought the white beans and chard. I busted out a v tasty brunello. What could go wrong?

Nothing. Perfectly cooked and super juicy. I'll make another swirl this week as I do another Bertolli sausage recipe. It's an awesome presentation. And easier to cook!

The evening continued late into the night with an impromptu dance party fueled by housemade Limoncello. Pretty good.

One last pic.

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We have always been at somewhat of a loss when it comes to using pork skin. We have tried fried pork rinds in many different ways, many different times and only had so-so results (best so far has been Diana Kennedy's chicharrones recipe from My Mexico). For quite some time I have wanted to make Cotechino, the Emilia-Romagna sausage which in includes pork skin. In fact, I tried to drum up interest in a cotechino making party here about a year ago. Today my husband surprised me and made up a huge batch. He used the recipe from Paul Bertolli's Cooking by Hand. 

I have to admit I was a tiny bit wary. I have been a little under the weather and thought this sausage would be too rich and maybe even a little hard to handle texturally. (I've had Saba-braised Zampone--pork foot and foreleg stuffed with cotechino--at Oliveto's Whole Hog Dinner which was extremely rich, if a little dry.)  Bertolli's recipe was definitely rich, but not nearly as rich as I had imagined. And wow! was it delicious! The texture was not as uniform as a normal sausage, but still very lovely--as a country pâté is to a traditional smooth pâté. The spicing in the recipe is perfectly delicate without being invisible.

We weren't able to stuff the sausage in a natural casing as instructed, because this was very spontaneous and we didn't have the one the recipe called for (bung). Instead, we made two casings from butter muslin (which we use when we make liverwurst) which worked very well. I thought perhaps without the natural casing that the sausage would crumble when we cut it, but it held together beautifully.

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About 1-1/2 weeks after hanging I caught some pretty crazy mold just starting to grow. I gave the bresaola a good salt water scrub and rehung it. When I cut it down last weekend we just had a bit of white mold, which I did wipe away before I put it in the refrigerator. 

Overall, we're happy with the results and would definitely try this recipe again, perhaps doing a preliminary soak in wine next time.

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My friend had a bunch of ducks he shot up in Sacramento and I told him I would make some creations with them.  Nothing that crazy, and I don't know how it will taste, but we will see in a couple weeks, and making it is half the fun anyway, right?  I used Len Poli's recipe at http://lpoli.50webs.com/index_files/Game%20Bird%20Hunters%20Salami.pdf  

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Just posted my latest effort over on my blog, Just Pigs. Recipe included. 

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I remember from my last experience that we liked the spices slightly ramped up, so I kinda of did heaping measurements of everything. I used both sweet paprika and hot paprika (a little more of the hot than sweet). We ate a few sausages right away, but I'm letting the rest sit in the fridge for a couple of days to really get the full effect of the spices.

My daughter helped me yesterday and we had a lot of fun. It's pretty great having a six-year old who likes to grind and stuff sausage.  

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