Cure not working?

[dieseladdiction]

Hello all. This has happened a couple times and I am wondering if anyone knows what I may be doing wrong. Yesterday I mixed up some deer meat to make snack sticks. This morning i was going to stuff and smoke them but when i went to do it the outer skin of the burger was brown like it should have been but the inside was all red. Like the cure didn't work at all.
I use #1 and I used tsp for the hair shy of 5lb batch that is about 4 lb deer and like 3/4 lb pork. I dissolved cure in just a little bit of water and mixed for a few minutes.
Any ideas? Thank you

 

[daveomak]

Cure won't change the color of the meat until it is heated.. What change were you expecting ??? The outer "skin" of the burger is from oxidation... The interior "red" is from the outer skin protecting the interior ground meat from oxidation..

 

[dieseladdiction]

Usually it turns a darker color and then back to a pink/red when heated. Meat usually seems fo firm up a little too.
Each time it has acted like this time, I have gone thru with the stuffing and smoking and it has turned out bad. When I used stuffer it acts like it squishes all the juices out of the meat and I end up with watery mess. Has happened to me twice.

 

[Rings Я Us]

Outside brown on my corned beef. Inside fine with red cure color.

 

[dieseladdiction]

Whole meat vs ground meat. I understand oxidation and all. I just can't figure out why this has happened a couple of times. I hate having to throw out a batch of meat because of something I may be doing wrong. I need more consistency. If I was doing fresh sausage and it was like this I wouldn't worry but not put into casings. I can tell from past couple times it happened that if i try to stuff this as is then it will be a watery mess coming out of the stuffing tube. And I only used about 2 TBL water to mix the cure

 

[crazymoon]

DA, what are the other ingredients that you are adding to your sticks? Not adding enough salt will prevent your mix from setting up .

 

[dieseladdiction]

Well then that's probably the problem. I forgot to do that last night because this recipe calls for tq and I use #1. No other salt added in the recipe. So when I went to add salt this morning that's when I noticed that this he just didn't seem quite right.
So since this happened does anyone have a recommendation on how much salt to add to a recipe that has no salt listed except for tq? I added a TBL plus a pinch more for almost 5 lbs.

 

[tropics]

I use 2 Table spoons for 5 lb. do a fry test to see if you need more.
You could do a fry test with what you have,then adjust as needed.
Richie

 

[tropics]

Also mix til it is real sticky

 

[BGKYSmoker]

Why does my sausage turn brown?
Both myoglobin and oxymyoglobin have the ability to lose their oxidation which results in a brown color called metmyoglobin. This essentially means that meat can turn from a bright red color (which many associate with fresh) to a brown color from a lack of oxygen. Meat can also turn brown if any sort of contamination that would cause a chemical reaction comes in contact with it. For example, cure (sodium nitrite) turns raw meat a brownish-grey color (think of a cured, uncooked salami) if it comes in direct contact with a meat surface, but if that same meat is then heated, the sodium nitrite turns the meat a pinkish color (much like ham). In order for meat to maintain that bright red color we are familiar with, oxygen must be available at a sufficient concentration. That is why grocery stores utilize a small film over their products versus a vacuum package. Browning of meat can also occur with meat that has been chilled for a long period of time (about 5 days), ie: taken home from the grocery store and placed in your fridge for some time. This happens because as meat is chilled/frozen for long periods of time, enzyme activity decreases so the myoglobin and oxygen quit mixing together to keep meat that bright red color.

 

[Bearcarver]

Outside brown on my corned beef. Inside fine with red cure color.

He's talking about Ground meat, not Whole meat.
Not the same.


Bear

 

[wild west]

A good rule of thumb for salt is 2% by weight. Because cure #1 is mostly salt that should be factored in. If im not useing a calculator like this one http://diggingdogfarm.com/page2.html i use the full weight of the cure in my calculation for salt in the recipe as cure #1 is 93.75% salt and 6.25% nitrite. For anyone on a low salt diet or prefers less salt the 2% rule can be reduced but the weight of cure #1 cannot. Its also a good idea to go by weight rather than volume because different salts differ in weight.

 

[daveomak]

OH !! You used cure#1 and didn't add salt... OK, add 2% kosher salt to what you have...
for 1#'s of meat, that's ~9 grams ..
There are 12 tsp. or 4 TBS. per 1/4 cup... depends on what salt you are using to get the correct amount..
A grams scale makes life easy and your recipes repeatable... about $10 for a 0-100 grams capacity..
1 TBS. of Diamond Crystal weighs about 11 grams... 1 tsp. about 4 grams.
1 TBS. of Morton's Kosher weighs about 15 grams... 1 tsp. about 5 grams..
Salt Type ..........................................Weight of 1/4 cup (grams
Morton’s Table Salt..................................... 76.0
Morton Pickling Salt.................................... 74.0
La Baleine Coarse Sea Salt.........................66.8
La Baleine Fine Sea Salt............................ 64.8
Morton’s Kosher Salt.................................. 62.0
Diamond Crystal Kosher Salt..................... 45.2
Maldon Sea Salt......................................... 33.2

 

[BGKYSmoker]

1 Level tsp of cure #1 does not have enough salt in it to affect the final product. Remember 1 tsp not, 4T

 

[motocrash]

KISS -Use pops for wet cure and diggingdogfarm for dry cure.;)

 

[dieseladdiction]

It may have been the salt. I just checked it about an hour ago and it was good to go now. Have it stuffed and in smoker

 

[indaswamp]

Best way to check the cure is to fry a small test piece. If you outside layer turns pink you are good to go. You can also check the seasoning before stuffing which is a good plan regardless.