Culinary Chemistry / The Scientific Principles of Cookery, with Concise Instructions for Preparing Good and Wholesome Pickles, Vinegar, Conserves, Fruit Jellies, Marmalades, and Various Other Alimentary Substances Employed in Domestic Economy, with Observations on the Chemical Constitution and Nutritive Qualities of Different Kinds of Food.

by Friedrich Christian Accum

PICKLING AND DRY SALTING OF MEAT.

Common salt is advantageously employed as an antiseptic, to preserve aliments from spontaneous decomposition, and particularly to prevent the putrefaction of animal food. In general, however, the large quantity of salt which is necessarily employed in this way, deteriorates the alimentary properties of the meat, and the longer it has been preserved, the less wholesome and digestible does it become.

Meat, however, which has not been too long preserved, simply pickled, or corned meat as it is called, is but little injured or decomposed, it is still succulent and tender, easily digested, nourishing and wholesome enough.

The property of salt to preserve animal substances from putrefaction is of the most essential importance to the empire in general, and to the remote grazing districts in particular. It enables the latter to dispose of their live stock, and distant navigation is wholly dependant upon it. All kinds of animal substances may be preserved by salt, but beef and pork are the only staple articles of this kind. In general, the pieces of the animal best fitted for being salted are those which contain fewest large blood vessels, and are most solid. Some recommend all the glands to be cut out, they say, that without this precaution meat cannot be preserved; but this is a mistake, a dry salter of eminence, informs me, that it is not essential, provided the glands or kernels are properly covered with salt.

The salting may be performed either by dry rubbing, or better by immersing the meat in a salt pickle. Cured in the former way the meat will keep longer, but it is more altered in its valuable properties; in the latter way it is more delicate and nutritious. Eight pounds of salt, one pound of sugar, and four ounces of saltpetre, boiled for a few minutes with four gallons of water, skimmed and allowed to cool, forms a strong pickle, which will preserve meat completely immersed in it. To effect this, which is essential, either a heavy board, or flat stone, must be laid upon the meat. The same pickle may be used repeatedly, provided it be boiled up occasionally with additional salt to restore its strength, diminished by the combination of part of the salt with the meat, and by the dilution of the pickle by the juices of the meat extracted. By boiling, the albumen, which would cause the pickle to spoil, is coagulated, and rises in the form of scum, which must be carefully removed.

Beef and pork, although properly salted with salt alone, acquire a green colour; but if an ounce of saltpetre be added to each five pounds of salt employed, the muscular fibre acquires a fine red tinge; but this improvement in appearance is more than compensated by its becoming harder and harsher to the taste; to correct which, a proportion of sugar or molasses is often added. But the red colour may be given if desired, without hardening the meat, by the addition of a little cochineal.

Meat kept immersed in pickle rather gains weight. In one experiment by Messrs. Donkin and Gamble, there was a gain of three per cent. and in another of two and a half; but in the common way of salting, when the meat is not immersed in pickle there is a loss of about one pound, or one and a half in sixteen.

Dry salting is performed by rubbing the surface of the meat all over with salt; and it is generally believed that the process of salting is promoted if the salt be rubbed in with a heavy hand. However this may be, it is almost certain that very little salt penetrates, except through the cut surfaces, to which it should therefore be chiefly applied; and all holes, whether natural or artificial, should be particularly attended to. For each twenty-five pounds of meat, about two pounds of coarse grained salt should be allowed, and the whole, previously heated, rubbed in at once. When laid in the pickling tub, a brine is soon formed by the salt dissolved in the juice of the meat which it extracts, and with this the meat should be wetted every day, and a different side turned down. In ten or twelve days it will be sufficiently cured.

For domestic use the meat should not be salted as soon as it comes from the market, but kept until its fibre has become short and tender, as these changes do not take place after it has been acted upon by the salt. But in the provision trade, “the expedition with which the animals are slaughtered, the meat cut up and salted, and afterwards packed, is astonishing.”[31]

[31] Wakefield’s Ireland, vol. I. p. 750.

By salting the meat while still warm, and before the fluids are coagulated, the salt penetrates immediately, by means of the vessels, through the whole substance of the meat; and hence meat is admirably cured at Tunis, even in the hottest season, so that Mr. Jackson, in his Reflections on the Trade in the Mediterranean, recommends ships being supplied there with their provisions.

The following mixture of condiments is exceedingly well calculated for dry salting.

Take a pound of black pepper, a quarter of a pound of Cayenne pepper, and a pound of saltpetre, all ground very fine; mix these three well together, and blend them alternately with about three quarts of very fine salt: this mixture is sufficient for eight hundred weight of beef. As the pieces are brought from the person cutting up, first sprinkle the pieces with the spice, and introduce a little into all the thickest parts; if it cannot be done otherwise, make a small incision with a knife. The first salter, after rubbing salt and spice well into the meat, should take and mould the piece, the same as washing a shirt upon a board; this may be very easily done, and the meat being lately killed, is soft and pliable; this moulding opens the grain of the meat, which will make it imbibe the spice and salt much quicker than the common method of salting. The first salter hands his piece over to the second salter, who moulds and rubs the salt well into the meat, and if he observes occasion, introduces the spice; when the second salter has finished his piece, he folds it up as close as possible, and hands it to the packer at the harness or salting tubs, who must be stationed near him: the packer must be careful to pack his harness tubs as close as possible.

All the work must be carried on in the shade, but where there is a strong current of air, the harness tubs in particular; this being a very material point in curing the meat in a hot climate. Meat may be cured in this manner with the greatest safety, when the thermometer, in the shade, is at 110°, the extreme heat assisting the curing.

A good sized bullock, of six or seven hundred weight, may be killed and salted within the hour.

The person who attends with the spice near the first salter, has the greatest trust imposed upon him; besides the spice, he should be well satisfied that the piece is sufficiently salted, before he permits the first salter to hand the piece over to the second salter.

All the salt should be very fine, and the packer, besides sprinkling the bottom of his harness tubs, should be careful to put plenty of salt between each tier of meat, which is very soon turned into the finest pickle. The pickle will nearly cover the meat, as fast as the packer can stow it away. It is always a good sign that the meat is very safe when the packer begins to complain that his hands are aching with cold.

By this method there is no doubt but that the meat is perfectly cured in three hours from the time of killing the bullock: the saltpetre in a very little time strikes through the meat; however, it is always better to let it lie in the harness tubs till the following morning, when it will have an exceeding pleasant smell on opening the harness tubs; then take it out and pack it in tight barrels, with its own pickle.