Pancetta Arrotolata!

[Joe Hell]

Wish me luck! This is my first attempt at something like this. Patience will be my virtue.

The recipe called for Insta Cure #2. Does anyone know if there would be an issue with cooking/eating the trim meat sooner than the time required to fully cure the full cuts or should I cure those along side the others?

[macsinsac]

I bet that’s going to be very tasty.

[Jonathon]

Joe Hell they both look gorgeous! Salt + Time will make you very happy! Where are you planning on letting it age?

[Joe Hell]

Jonathon I have a mini fridge with temp/humidity controls. I started the demo on the basement aging room yesterday…can o’ worms! lol

[Joe Hell]

Joe Hell Here is a link to a ‘worksheet’ to log your pancetta recipe info

pancetta-arrotolata-cure-ratio.pdf

[PapaSop]

Joe Hell
Great…Something else I’ve never heard of before. Now I have to look that up. LOL. Very nice lacing job on that.

[Joe Hell]

PapaSop When people make a funny face when I mention pancetta I just tell them to think ‘fancy a*s bacon’.

[Lance]

Joe Hell
Dang I bet that’s going to be good.

[Jonathon]

Joe Hell Do you have a window into that? I’ve got two Coppas going right now and I am going to be taking periodic pictures of them so we can do a time lapse sort of thing. It might be neat if you took a daily or every few days pictures and did one too.

[Joe Hell]

Jonathon I could do something like that. The lighting in my current room sucks however. One problem I ran into within the first 24 hours was that the meat or trussing ‘sagged’ a bit so it made contact with the bottom of the fridge (it’s very tiny). I have since placed them on a rack and will rotate a couple of times per day until I come up with a better alternative. I spied a small freezer on the curb at a house near my folks with a sign that said ‘free’ on it. That might be an option for a quick curing chamber.

[Jonathon]

Joe Hell as long is doesnt take away from valuable demo time to start your curing room! A small freezer/fridge is a great thing to use to make a chamber. That’s basically what the guts of an expensive commercial drying cabinet is anyway!

[Joe Hell]

Jonathon I took down a wall yesterday and a friend (expert brick and concrete guy) is loaning all of the tools and gifting some left over materials. It might come together quicker than I would have thought. It’s one hell of a mess right now but it already smells like a basement.

[Lance]

Do you guys have any plans you’d care to share on a homemade curing chamber?

[Joe Hell]

Lance deplorablenc1 had some great posts around here with his set up. He’s much more an expert than I am. I haven’t seen much of him lately around here but I’d love to pick his brain about the process and his observations.

Inkbird makes affordable controls to take care of temp and humidity. You just need a clean fridge or freezer, a small humidifier and a heat source (which can be as simple as a light bulb).

https://www.[link removed]/p/Inkbird-Combination-Humidity-Controller-Ihc200-Temperature-Controller-Itc308/26020101473?thm=1000

For my basement room I will use a portable AC to keep it cool. If it can’t reach the temps I hope it will I can work around that by utilizing a CoolBot which can turn any modern AC unit into something capable of powering a walk-in cooler.

[Lance]

Joe Hell awesome thank you

[Joe Hell]

Lance I ended up needing to order a new fridge quicker than I anticipated. The pancetta sagged a bit after 24 hours. One was just making contact with the fridge floor and the other was not far. For the last 6 days I had them horizontal on a rack. With the new fridge in place I now have plenty room to hang a few meat projects. The old fridge will now be used for aging cheese…that is when I get time to take up another hobby.

[Dave R]

Joe Hell nice trussing,

[Joe Hell]

Dave R thanks! It’s been fun to practice!

[Jonathon]

Joe Hell That is alot of compliments on your trussing, our application specialist said the exact same thing! Can’t wait to see it finished!

[Joe Hell]

Almost ready!