Rob Levitt, owner and head butcher of Chicago's The Butcher & Larder.
Photos by Huge Galdones.
Christoph peering through the pig. Photo by Jürgen Schmücking.
Mangalitsas, aka Wooly Pigs. Photo by Jürgen Schmücking.
To celebrate this week's publication of Salumi, my and Brian Polycn's deeper quest into the craft of dry-curing meat, I'm giving away three copies signed by both me and Brian to three commenters on this post.
For those who aren't clear on the definition (and Italians don't make things easy), salumi refers to Italian cured or preserved meats—mostly dry-cured, and mostly made from pig parts—everything from guanciale to mortadella to prosciutto. Salami, with an A rather than a U, are dry-cured sausages and are one of the many preparations that salumi comprises.
My aim, as in much of my cookbook work, is to simplify what seems to be complicated. When I walked into my first salumeria, I was astonished by the variety available. Case upon case of salumi, whole sections devoted to different kinds of lardo, different types of prosciutto, and ...
Amazon is always ahead, damn them! They'd been advertising an August 27 release date for my new book, Salumi: The Craft of Italian Dry Curing, but suddenly I'm getting twitpics from people who have ordered and already received their copy!
The video isn't ready, but you folks clearly are, so here it is, Brian Polcyn's and my Salumi, the follow-up to our previous love song to animal fat and salt. The new book focuses on dry-curing meat, both whole muscles, such as coppa and pancetta, and ground meat, such as salami.
Charcuterie encompassed a broad range of preserved foods, including pâtés and confits. With a couple of exceptions (mortadella, the sopressata of Tuscany, which is the Italian version of french fromage de tête), salumi refers to salted, dried meats that are, when done well, with well-fed, ...
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