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Hey guys, I was making polish sausages this weekend, which I normally use sodium nitrate as my cure, and slowly bring them to an internal temp of 152 degrees in the smoker. I decided I wanted to take a couple of them and dry cure them for 2 weeks, instead of cooking them. For 10 pounds of meat, I had 1 T celery salt, 3 T pickling salt, and a heaping T of L.E.M. cure, which on the ingredients lists- Salt, sodium nitrite(6.25%).

My question is, is this enough sodium nitrite for what I am doing, or should I just throw them out? They are currently being stored at 50 degrees and about 50-60% humidity. There are plenty of other ingredients in the sausage, but I figured the salts were the only real important ones for this question.

Hi Workhorse,
The cure you used is more commonly known as cure#1 or Instacure #1 or Prague powder #1, it's usage you can find here http://www.wedlinydomowe.com/ppmCalcula ... ulator.htm
Enter the meat weight in grams, leave the parts per million at 156 and click on calculate.
For your amount of meat you'd use 11.3 grams of the cure, you'd have to find out what a "heaping T" weighs.

LD

Thanks LD. Assuming curing salt is similar in weight to table salt, I have 18 grams of cure per 10 lbs of meat. So too much, but technically safe for a 15 day dry cure?

workhorse wrote:but technically safe for a 15 day dry cure?

If you use the link above the FDA limit is 200PPM, yours has 250PPM.
As to whether yours will be at a safe level after 15days I do not know.

What about the sausages that you are not drying? Have they been stuffed and cooked?

LD

Stuffed and smoked, starting at 130 degrees F and increasing by 10 degrees each hour up to 165 degrees, maintaining until internal temp reaches 152 degrees. They turned out fantastic.
Flavorful and juicy but not salty. Good firmness and texture.

Any chance of posting your recipe

LD

Of course, I will even share some photos!

smoked Polish sausage
10 lbs pork- 30% fat
3 Tablespoons salt
1 Tablespoon curing salt
1 Tablespoon black pepper
1 Tablespoon sugar
1 Tablespoon marjoram
1 Tablespoon mustard seeds
1 teaspoon ground savory
10 cloves crushed fresh garlic
1 cup ice water
1 cup powdered milk

They look great!

Email me one for my lunch!