Brine cure

[DanMcG]

Jim are you saying it lost a third of its original weight? How is that possible?

[BriCan]

Jim are you saying it lost a third of its original weight? How is that possible?

Overcooked

if I look at this

simmered it until internal temp was 69 deg

one has to assume that he is talking C. which will equate to being 156 degrees F. even if left in water there will be a rise of approx 20 degrees putting it at 156 + 20 = 176 degrees F which is over cooked as internal temp only needs to 'attain' 160 degrees F (165 degrees F if you want to play safer)

Taking (simmering) until internal temperature reaches 140 degrees F and leaving the ham sitting in the liquid for about half hour will/should (mine dose all the time) bring the core temperature up to the desired temperature of 160/165 degrees F thus retaing a lot more moisture I let my hams sit in the liquid until cool/cold

I will now retreat to the caves awaiting the back lash

[Salmo]

What's the taste like Jim?

[wheels]

Is the first weight with skin and the second without?

Phil

[captain wassname]

weighed in and weighed out same piece skin on.It sliced nice and tastes good.
Robert I took it out of the water as soon as reached temp.Same as all my others.Only change was it wasnt in a bag due to size and shape.
Its all frozen now half sliced the rest will be baked .Ill post photos when its defrosted.

Jim

[captain wassname]

Just a thought what about nitrite levels.

Jim

[DanMcG]

Just a thought what about nitrite levels.

What do ya mean Jim. your calc's look like 150ppm if you using 0.06% cure. or are you asking something different?

[captain wassname]

Cure was constucted to deliver 150 or so ppm nitrite in finished product But assumng all nitrite is absorbed what would be the the level of nitrite be in the finished product.given the weight loss.

jim

[DanMcG]

would it not still be 150ppm? It was calculated for the total 3kg so if you loose 33% in the cook or you slice off 33% for the cook would the remainder still be 150ppm?
Dang i got to think about this one ...and need a drink now too.

[captain wassname]

I would assume that there is 7.5 gms of cure no 1 and the weight loss wa all water.so my remaining 2kgs had all the cure.

Jim

[DanMcG]

My thought was that if the cure was in solution and you lost some of it, then you also lost a proportional amount of cure.
I really don't know, just thinking out loud.

[wheels]

I don't see that it matters Jim. The rule is for the ingoing amount. Surely, by the time it's cooked there should be no cure 'left' (for want of better words!).

Phil

[Salmo]

A novice here-just thinking in print!
Presumably any excess Nitrite,that is more than the meat can reduce to Nitric oxide,will remain in the meat as Nitrite & ,again presumably, this excess Nitrite is what gives rise to health concerns?
One of the unknowns is how much Sodium Nitrite migrates out of the meat during the cooking process.
Sodium Nitrite is (of course) soluble in water,just like table salt (Sodium Chloride).
We know that the cooking water will become salty from Sodium Chloride migrating into it during cooking, so it seems logical to assume that excess Nitrite will do the same.
Trouble is without some sophisticated gadgets it's impossible to know.
Perhaps somebody has access to a gas chromatography machine and could check their cooking liquor after cooking,just to see how much Nitrite it contains.
Seems a lot of aggro though

[captain wassname]

Im convinced that this lump of pork had excess water in it I struggled to get an 8% pump into it.

jim

[yotmon]

Hi Jim, I think you are probably right as you mentioned in your first post that it was a 'cheap' piece of meat. Water content varies wildly depending on the quality, age and process that the meat has undergone since slaughter. If you take a slaughtered pig , quickly cool it, bone it and then 'cryvac' it all within hours of death, then you are trapping all the natural water within the meat (more weight = more money) which will leach out when unwrapped or cooked. Fresh pork sides allowed to cool, hung for a day or two on the bone and then butchered correctly will have a lot less water in them. You only have to look at wrapped meat on supermarket shelves to see them 'swimming' in exuded water, especially large joints of beef.