# Accidentally didn't put in enough curing salt



## smokingrev17 (Dec 23, 2016)

I was mixing some meat tonight that I'm going to smoke tomorrow for some venison summer sausage. The mix on the recipe is 5 pounds of pork and 10 pounds of venison with 8 oz of tenderquick salt. 

I guess I looked at the scale I was using wrong ( I got my job so I wouldn't have to do math!) and I came out with more meat prepped then I should have. I'll be checking again in the morning when I'm not tired, but it seems I ended up with 18 pounds of meat that I already packed into the sleeves. Is this something that I need to worry about? I'm planning on smoking it all tomorrow and will get it up to the right temp that I know I need to do, but I want to make sure everything will be safe to eat. 

Do I need to unload all the meat form the sleeves and add a bit more salt or should it all be ok?


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## daveomak (Dec 23, 2016)

From the weights, 18#'s, you posted, your salt is about 2.7% and the nitrtie is about 138 Ppm, 8 oz TQ...   looks good to me...  very typical for TQ use...

If you find it too salty, about the only thing you can do is switch to cure #1 where you add the salt separate from the cure...  or, cut down on the TQ to 2% of the weight of the meat which puts the nitrite at about 100 Ppm which is a bit low to be sure you are safe.....   If I remember correctly, the lower acceptable limit for nitrite, according to the USDA, is about 120 Ppm...


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## chef jimmyj (Dec 23, 2016)

Dave is spot-on. You are still in the acceptable range for safety...JJ


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## smokingrev17 (Dec 23, 2016)

Thanks you guys, this came with a sigh of relief! I thought for a moment that I was going to have to cut all the sleeves up, mix in a bit more spice and salt, and then re-stuff them. I'm hoping I didn't lose too much of the flavor of all the other spices, but we'll see. Heading out to smoke them today! 

Thanks again! Have a Merry Christmas!


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## daveomak (Dec 23, 2016)

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