Help please
I followed the recipe from Ruhlman's Charcuterie book
First oi made the # cure 15 parts non iodised salt and 1 part sodium nitrite.
i then mixed 450g salt, 225 g sugar 50g # cure to make their basic dry cure
I then had a nice 6kg side of back bacon and added 240g of the bacic cure, put in a large plastic bag in the fridge for 7 days, massaging daily.
The resulting pork didn't taste of bacon at all just sweet pork slightly salty.
Any ideas? we make bacon commercially with a bought commercial cure and its perfect but the manufacturer is very tight lipped about what was in it. As i wanted to make canadian bacon and pancetta i thought i would try their basic cure as a bench mark to compare with the commercial cure. The ommercial cure costs about 5pounds per kg... is that expensive?
In Oddleys recipe he also adds saltpetre which i believe to be potassium nitrite correct? That is not available here can I just add extra sodium nitrite? if so, a direct replacement weight for weight? What is the effect of adding Sodium Ascorbate?
Thanks to anyone who will help