Advice on Salami making please

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zebtax

Assistant Cook
Joined
Mar 29, 2022
Messages
1
Location
North Carolina
Hello everyone. So I am new to fermenting sausages and salami etc.. I have some GREAT books about it and have done a lot of research and videos' etc.

I made a batch 2 days ago of salami. Everything was followed exactly as it should be and I used the starter culture as the recipe called for. The chamber for the first 72 hours of fermentation is set properly..68 degrees 85-90 percent humidity.

All ingredients were fresh.

So here is the question.. is there supposed to be a sour/bad smell coming from the fermenting salamis? It is pretty strong and started pretty quickly after I placed them in the fermenting chamber.
 
Hello zebtax, Welcome to DC!

Wow, I had to look up "fermenting sausages" as I had never heard of that.

We do have members here that are into sausage making, hopefully one will be able to help you. Have you also tried other forums that are specifically for curing and sausage making?

I have made wine and beer and, IMHO, anything that needs fermenting is going to give off a smell. Sour is not necessarily 'bad'.

Other than those comments I'm afraid I can't help. 'Bad', 'sour', 'smell' are all pretty subjective.
 
Welcome to Discuss Cooking, zebtax. First off, I have never cured any salami, so definitely not an expert. I'm not surprised there is a smell. There is a culture, to grow micro-organisms that will lower the pH so the bad micro-organisms won't be able to grow. When curing vegetables, the sour smell is how you know that the fermenting has started. Sour smell is associated with acid and lower pH.
 
Yeah, a bit of a sour smell is normal. But I'm not an expert, having only made snack sticks

I hope the rules allow. For in depth info about curing and your questions, I would recommend this forum: https://wedlinydomowe.pl/en/index.php?sid=3155d433f4410ab64b7df108e6625cd2
Fermenting & curing meat is not without danger, so please be sure of what you are doing.

Please post pictures & taste tests etc here in this thread

Good luck
 
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