Mortadella fat content: how low can you go?

[larry]

I'm about halfway through my first attempt at mortadella--halfway through eating it, not making it--and the more I think about it, the more I worry about just how much fat is in it. I used the Ruhlman recipe from Charcuterie, and it tastes great (I did post earlier about the color being too white), but the recipe called for essentially equal parts of pork meat and fat. The end result is a mortadella around three pounds, which breaks down roughly as 1lb. meat, 1lb. fat and 1lb moisture, binder, etc. I want to try another batch with far less ground fat, but still retain the cubed, blanched fat. Has anybody tried such a thing? Maybe 4oz. ground fat to a pound of pork, and 2oz. diced blanched fat? I'm new to emulsified sausages, so I'm not sure what the result will be from cutting out a lot of the fat. I'm going to try it. If it doesn't work out, I'll just have to practice more moderation in my consumption.

[wheels]

The official Mortadella Bologna specification says that there should be:

...in the slice there must be, in a quantity of not less than 15% of the total mass, perlaceous white squares of adipose tissue, possibly joined to muscular fragments.

So that's 15% white bits! The recipe I used has almost as much fat as lean - I guess that it's the nature of the beast. Maintaining the consistency may be difficult with a lower amount.

Phil

[larry]

Yeah. That's the hard part. Since there's some fat even in the lean shoulder or butt, and the diced fat really has to be there for it to be mortadella, I don't see getting below 20% total fat, or even near it. I'm guessing that the batch I made would probably come out at 38% fat or higher. I guess I just shouldn't make giant sandwiches out of it, but they're sooo good. I don't think that real mortadella was ever intended for the type of sandwiches we've gotten used to in the U.S., which often contain 8 oz. of meat.

If my lean experiment fails, at least my dogs will be happy. If it works, maybe I should call it Less-tadella.

[wheels]

...for the type of sandwiches we've gotten used to in the U.S., which often contain 8 oz. of meat.

Hey, I can tell you about Mortadella - for self control you'll have to try elsewhere!

Phil