Home Cured Bresaola

Yes folks, its moldy meat drama time again.

Some long time readers (hi Danika, hi Mum) might remember the saga of me curing a bresaola at home last year. In fact, it was about 10 months ago if memory serves me. Thankfully actually, memory doesn’t have do anything – I have posts on that last emotional episode –

The initial setup

Traumatic update

Trash Can

Back then, the humidity dropped too low, caused case hardening (outside dries out too fast, inside stays wet, develops rot), and ended up in the trash can. Was a bit of an emotional ride for some reason.

After doing that failed bresaola I tried my hand at duck proscuitto. That turned out wonderfully. I might be doing some more of that pretty soon, it was that tasty (and darn right easy).

This time round with another piece of eye of round (the cut for a small bresaola), I am doing things differently. A friend who works at a hotel/restaurant in Seattle gave me a call to say that the place wanted to get rid of some old wine coolers that they had converted to be meat curing lockers. Get rid of it for free I should mention. Turns out this wine cooler is just about perfect – holds a great temperature, is large, and pretty economical (far more than an old fridge I got off craigslist to do the same job..). This should give me a far more controlled environment than just hanging the meat in a cage, in my garage.

Turns out I am still having some humidity problems, but have them under control somewhat. It still varies a lot, especially when the wine cooler turns on – it of course blows dry cold air into the chamber, which lowers the humidity. Keeping the door open a jar has helped, but it isn’t perfect. I have a humidifier on the way, which I am going to bung in the bottom of the wine cooler – that should sort it out once and for all.

So – the bresaola. You rub a trimmed eye of round in salt and spices, and let it pretty much sit in the fridge for two weeks – turning and rubbing every now and again. You clean it off, tie it up, and hang it in a cool, humid place until pretty much stiff, and it has lost about 30% of its weight.

This hunk of beef has been hanging now for about 3 weeks. It is pretty darn firm (a little too firm on the exterior for my liking, but should be OK) – I am hoping just another week will see it done. I just couldn’t resist posting a few shots of it now though.

Thankfully this one isn’t quite as much drama. I know a little more about the process now. The humidity has been a source of worry – but I am learning just to adapt, make changes, relax a bit (Danika might tell you otherwise..), and see how it goes. If it is another trash can job, I haven’t lost much cash, just time and love.

Friends on twitter have thought differently however! Comments like: “mamster @wrightfood You and your bresaola. The drama never ends.” and the rather cheeky: “ChefReinvented @mamster seriously, man @wrightfood should just go buy some, hang it in his basement, snap its beauty shot and call it a day”.

So perhaps this experiment in narrowly dodging boutulism poisoning isn’t quite as drama free as I first thought…