About 3 week ago, i brought in a wild boar shoulder to make a salami i've been wanting to make for a while. I had never seen a boar shoulder before and when it came in i thought my meat distributor had screwed up because what i was looking at looked more like a de-boned venison leg. i called a few butchers i knew and by there description it was infact a boar shoulder. Much leaner and darker then i would have though. Anyways, it wasn't nearly big enough for the three beef bungs that i had for it. So i looked to see what scrap meat i had in the kitchen and the closest thing i could find was some bison striploin trimmings. It wasn't very gamey smelling and the colour was similar and i had everything else ready to make the salami so i ran with what i had.
I based my recipe on several different salami recipes, some of my own, salt levels of bertolli's and fennel ratio from a salami on the cured meats blog.
First off, i reduced the wine with a few whole garlic cloves down to about 1 cup then discarded the garlic. I do this so the wine takes on a nice garlic flavor which distributes itself in the meat nicely. I weighed out my starter culture in proportion to my meat and fat content and put enough distilled water (preferably room temp) in to dissolve the culture. I also added a pinch of dextrose. Do this prior to grinding so you give your culture enough time to wake all that good bacteria up. After chilling the meat and fat in the freezer till nearly frozen (think crisp), i ground the meat through a coarse die into a chilled hotel pan. I added the cubed fat, spices, salt, and red wine reduction and mixed well. I then added the remaining dextrose and starter culture and gave it a good mix to promote the natural myosin in the meat.
I stuffed the salami mix into beef bung casings and went through the typical process of pricking to get any air holes out. I find this a little tougher with beef bungs as they are so big so what i usually do is hold them up with one hand, prick, and let gravity do the rest as i slowly move the hand thats holding the salami downwards as the casing frees up some space.
Once the salami's were all tied up, i put them in a fermentation chamber, which in this case was a rubbermaid with a resting rack inside. i put a little water on the bottom and left the lid only slighty ajar so it wouldn't get to humid, but humid enough. I fermented these guys for 36 hours and then into the fridge they went.
Its been three weeks now, they've lost about 15% of there mass. I'm guessing another month and they will be ready.
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