wade wrote:essexsmoker wrote:I thought the US regs recommend 200ppm max and min 120ppm in the meat itself?
I saw somewhere a wet cure that uses 120ppm solution (or whatever strength you want) so that you can never over nitrite because there is a max 120ppm in the solution. Over time the meat and solution equilibrate.
Complete novice to curing so might have it completely arse about face. Lol.
Let the confusion begin - LOL. From reading posts online I thought that too until I started to dig deeper into it a few years ago.
The US and UK approach the limits slightly differently (but bear in mind these are for commercial preparation and not for home production)
In the EU the maximum permitted residual levels in bacon for Nitrites is 175 mg/Kg (ppm) and for Nitrates is 250 mg/kg (ppm)
In the US Nitrates are not permitted for use in bacon because of the risk of Nitrosamine production when fried at high temperatures.
In the US the 200 mg/kg (ppm) is the "
maximum ingoing" for Nitrite in meat and poultry products - and not the residual amounts after curing. The maximum ingoing for Nitrate is 700 mg/kg (ppm) where permitted. Unfortunately the definition of "ingoing" is not particularly clear as it seems to be defined differently in different official documents. There seems to be no defined maximum residual value for Nitrite in the US, however as the EU specify 170 mg/kg (ppm), if there was one is would be unlikely to differ greatly from this.
There is a lot to digest here.
essexsmoker wrote:I thought the US regs recommend 200ppm max and min 120ppm in the meat itself?
The US regs refer to ingoing amounts and a minimum of 120PPM is required.
The max of 200PPM refers to Nitrite in immersion or pumped/injected cures and Rind-On bacon.
The US limits for nitrite in sausage and dry cures are 156PPM and 625PPM respectively. It should be noted that most authorities on the subject of curing would not recommend anything approaching the 625PPM limit.
The US limits for Dry cured bacon are slightly different. The limit is 200 ppm of sodium nitrite or equivalent of potassium nitrite (246 ppm) in Rind-Off bacon and 180PPM sodium nitrite (221PPM potassium nitrite) in Rind-On.
Pumped/injected and dry cures are simple to calculate and the US handbook specifies the method it should be done.
Unfortunately, for the calculation of immersion cures they give 2 methods. The one that Wade prefers is by far the most accurate/sensible. As to the other method, when asked, even the US authorities that wrote it couldn't explain the logic/science behind it.
Wade wrote:In the EU the maximum permitted residual levels in bacon for Nitrites is 175 mg/Kg (ppm) and for Nitrates is 250 mg/kg (ppm)
The residual limits that you refer to are only for certain existing products made to specific processes. The legislation also refers to 'Similar products' to those mentioned, however, the
UK guidance notes (.pdf link - see page 26 et seq) strongly suggest that these should have been made for at least 25 years before the 2007 legislation was introduced to qualify.
The EU limit for all of these items is otherwise 150 PPM ingoing. This was the recommendation of the EFSA scientists that advised on it:
http://www.efsa.europa.eu/sites/default ... nts/14.pdfThe scientists were quite clear that they think that working on maximum ingoing amounts is the best way and that the limit should be 150PPM ingoing. The research reviewed showed little relationship between residual nitrite and product safety so no maximum residual amount was specified (other than in the derogations).
It seems logical to work to the 150PPM ingoing amount, particularly as this is far easier to calculate/verify in all but immersion cures. Working to residual amounts would be costly as it would require testing. Unless, of course, one chose to use an ingoing amount less than the maximum residual in the derogation!
That said, the law only refers to commercial producers so when producing for their own use people can do as they like.
I hope this helps.
Wade wrote:For home use, for wt brining, you are safest using a cure that is the maximum strength of the final residual cure concentration that you are looking to achieve. This is called equilibrium brining, and providing you leave the meat in the brine long enough (10-14 days) then you can reasonably assume that an equilibrium will have been reached throughout the meat - though in the meat itself it will always be slightly lower because of the mass of the meat fibres.
That's fantastic advice for anyone planning to immersion cure meat.
Another excellent way of curing ham and similar things is a combination of dry and injection curing...
...but that's another story!
MM