The Concise Beginner's Guide to Curing Foods
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About this ebook
The concise Beginner's Guide to Curing Foods isn't a cookbook. Instead, author Stephen Bernhard helps the reader become comfortable with the basics of salting, brining, and smoking foods. Written to help the beginning charcutier (a person who typically uses these techniques) in understanding the basic principles of these preparation methods, The concise beginner's Guide to Curing Foods is informative and easy to understand and follow.
Topics include kitchen health and safety, tools and ingredients, starter recipes for readers to begin and experiment with, tips and tricks to make things easier and safer, and much more. This book demystifies the techniques used to make delicious dishes which will leave your dinner guests amazed and hungry for seconds (and maybe thirds).
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Book preview
The Concise Beginner's Guide to Curing Foods - Stephen Bernhard
The Concise Beginner's Guide to Curing Foods
By Stephen Bernhard
SmashWords Edition
Copyright 2013-2014, All Rights reserved. Reproduction of copyrighted material is prohibited without express written permission of the author.
Table of Contents
A Big Thank You!
Epigraph
In the Beginning…
Safety First!
Addressing Health Concerns
Tools of the Trade
I Don't Own a Smoker!
Got Wood?
A Salt Worth its Salt
Measuring Up...
Brined and Smoked Chicken Wings
Chicken Brine
Chicken
Stephen's Easy Chicken (and Pork) Glaze
More Ideas for This Recipe
Bacon (Need I Say More?)
Basic Bacon cure
Makin' Bacon
Smoked Bacon
Roasted Bacon
Other Baconlicious Ideas!
Straight Up Dill Pickles
Pickle Brine
Pickles
Other Ideas to Try
Smoked Fish
Selecting Fish
Fish Brine
Brining the Fish
Appendix A
Sources for Items
Appendix B
Cuts of the Pig
About the Author
A Big Thank You!
My desire to learn any of this may not have developed were it not for a few key people. I would like to take a moment just to say thanks.
Thank you to the management at the former Thriftway (now defunct) in Beechmont for allowing me to study under the wing of some super cool and super knowledgeable meat cutters.
Thank you to all of the people, cooks, chefs, authors, etc., from which I've learned and copied from (I admit it...).
Thank you to all of those who have provided advice, constructive criticism, and support.
Last, but certainly not least, thank you, Lisa!
Of course, I would be remiss if I didn't extend a sincere thanks to you, the reader, for selecting my book!
Salt is what makes things taste bad when it isn't in them.
-Anonymous
Salt. It graces the cover to this book, and enhances the flavor of most foods which we consume. It is so prevalent that you can't avoid taking in salt, only limit the amount. Yet it is absolutely essential to our existence. Without salt, we'd all be dead.
Not only do we add salt to our food to make it more palatable, we humans have also used salt for millennia to preserve our food. Salt's innate property to keep stuff from spoiling meant that everyone from sailors at sea for months or years to the peasants toiling in the fields would have something to eat during tough times when fresh food was nowhere to be found.
Nowadays, we still enjoy foods that have been cured with salt. In fact, we even pay a premium price in many instances. For example, a market in my area was selling salt cod for about $15 dollars a pound. This is a product which has been made for centuries in Europe, and allowed mariners and farmers alike to live their meager existences with something in their bellies. How things have changed... .
Combined with other ingredients and preparation techniques, salt can turn an ordinary cut of meat into something that will titillate everyone's taste buds. Or, if used incorrectly, it will make that same piece of flesh absolutely unpalatable. Working with salt can be a hit-or-miss affair. Some experience and experimentation will be in order, even for the most seasoned of cooks (ahem...).
This book won't just throw out recipes for you to follow. That isn't the purpose of this writing. I wanted to create this book to share with you what I have learned, so that you can take that information and run with it. I will discuss safety, health issues, and much more before we even get to donning our aprons. These are just as important (actually, more so in my opinion) as any recipe is. I want you to understand what is going on. That is why I have only included a handful of recipes which I believe demonstrate the covered topics best.
In addition to using salt to cure and brine foods, I will also discuss another one of my favorite preparation methods: smoking. Smoke and salt have a long, long lineage together, and I feel that it is only fitting to add smoking to this book on curing. Smoking isn't necessary to