also it seems like if you have the correct amount of Prague #1 and salt, then you only need to worry about minimum time, avoiding the problem of a wet brine over-curing.
is there a calculator (by weight for amounts and by thickness for time) to do this? I haven’t been able to find one.
thanks
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As we tell people on the free side of the site, we can't comment on curing recipes that come from other websites. We don't feel that most take into account the risks that are involved. (Serious Eats does not suggest how to scale the recipe, nor do they offer a calculator) Please know, I am not attempting to tell you what to do in your own kitchen, but we do want you to know where Amazingribs.com stands on dry curing. This is the main reason why we do not have a dry curing calculator.
The serious eats recipe is vacuum sealed and refrigerated the entire time. I shouldn’t have called it dry cure. Maybe it should be called vacuum cure.
Seems like it avoids the issue of over nitrating something, since, as in a dry brine, you use the amount required in the meat and then it all works its way in.
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Seems like thickness would only matter for minimum absorption time, not the amount of the salts, since there is no water solution and the salt amount is all expected to get into the meat (so it’s based on the final meat concentration needed).
My interpretation of the SE one is that all the prescribed salts go in the vacuum bag and are held against the surface. Then allowed enough time to cure in the fridge. Avoids over nitrating because you are using the amount for the meat, not the water so it can’t over absorb too much.
Found my answer, volume measurement though because if the small amount.
"If you input "0" liquid brine, the calculator spits out the amount of curing salt required to dry brine. At 150ppm, this is 2 TBS of Prague Powder #1 for 25 lbs of meat. You can also select a nitrite level up to 200 ppm, and no lower than the 25 ppm level to color and flavor. (Note different guidelines apply to dry curing ground meats, for shelf-stable deli meats, etc.)"
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Primo Oval xl
Slow n Sear (two)
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cast iron pans,
Dutch ovens
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My understanding of the amazing ribs recommended max wet cure time is not about the meat absorbing too much nitrite, it’s about not soaking meat in liquid for much longer than necessary just to be safe. I thought the minimum time was for the nitrite level in the meat to reach equilibrium with the nitrite level in the wet curing solution. I could certainly be wrong about this.
If it is intended to reach stasis, then the water solution is probably more reliable, though I’ve done a bunch with this method and got reliable results.
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Not to speak out of turn, but I'd be wary of the recipe you linked. It says to use 10 grams of pink salt (Prague Powder #1) per 2.25 Kg meat.
Since PP#1 is 1/16 sodium nitrite, that's 0.625 grams sodium nitrite per 2.25 Kg meat = 277 parts per million (ppm) sodium nitrite. In the US, the limit for sodium nitrite is 200ppm. The recipe then says to use 7.5 grams saltpeter (sodium nitrate) per 2.25 Kg meat. That's 3333ppm sodium nitrate. Without looking it up, I don't know what the sodium nitrate limit is, but I doubt its that high.
The amount of salt is about 1.3% of meat weight which is in the reasonable range. All the other spices are optional flavoring ingredients.
Dr. Blonder provides a recipe for dry cured corned beef (pastrami) here: https://genuineideas.com/ArticlesIndex/pastrami.html He recommends 140 ppm sodium nitrite. In his recipe, that comes out about 2.25 grams PP#1 per Kg meat and 0.32% salt. For my taste, that amount of salt is not enough, but its a matter of personal taste as salt is pretty much just a flavoring ingredient in corned beef or pastrami.
The quantity of PP#1 required for a given amount of meat can be calculated as (ppm desired)*16*(Kg meat)/1000.
If I'm full of it on this, hopefully somebody like docblonder will pipe up and straighten me out.
PS . . . If you're doing a cure in preparation for an aged product like bresaola or coppa, salt is much more important and should be at least about 2%.
Aged products really need to use Prague Salt #2. The sodium nitrite in Prague Salt #1 is pretty much used up after a few days- its main purpose is to quickly kill surface bacteria, and you either eat or freeze the meat before it can become re-contaminated. For long, air cured meats the nitrate in PS#1 is converted by safe bacteria into nitrite, so it continues to kill over months. This is long enough for the moisture levels to drop and salt levels to rise to provide long term protection.
I didn't include PS#2 in the calculator because aged meats and sausages are an adventure outside the Amazing Ribs realm. Safe handling goes way beyond brining.
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