Having been born-raised in Chicago, am Italian, many local cheese stores in the little Italy area, a couple of uncles, and a once close friend used to make a regular, run of the mill dried Italian Sausage.
I even made it myself on a number of occasions.
Some I've seen, was nothing more than some fresh bought sausage from the local butcher, they'd poke holes in the casing with a toothpick, and hang in a cool place, where temps wouldn't swing (basement-cellar-etc)
And some butchers, and cheese-deli shops would hang such in refrigerators, some had large walk-in units.
My friend, would buy 150 lbs of pork, grind, make dried sausages, soppresatas, Cappocollos.
But, I never seen any of them add anything more than just basic Salt, Pepper, Fennel, and that was it!
With my limited experimentation years ago when I lived in Chicago, I'd do such in the wintertime, and had hit or miss results.
I presume this is probably a dangerous way to dry-cure such. But, in truth, I never got sick.
They told me, that more salt should be added, that was the trick, but I suspect more should actually be done to make a safe dried sausage.
What is needed? What will properly cure such sausages, without overly influencing flavor-texture?
Again, I suspect cool temps are needed, something very hard for me to achieve here in the desert southwest New Mexico. I might need a spare junker Fridge to accomplish such? Or?