White Mold on Meat: Dry-Curing With Cultures

By Hector Kent
Published on December 1, 2015
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The easiest and most recommended way of controlling the growth and species of mold on your dry-curing is through the use of a purchased mold culture.
The easiest and most recommended way of controlling the growth and species of mold on your dry-curing is through the use of a purchased mold culture.
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Often times, commercial meat producers put rice flour or a similar white flour/powder on their salami to maintain the appearance that mold would have provided.
Often times, commercial meat producers put rice flour or a similar white flour/powder on their salami to maintain the appearance that mold would have provided.
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Any unknown mold, regardless of what it looks like, carries potential risk.
Any unknown mold, regardless of what it looks like, carries potential risk.
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Author Hector Kent offers step-by-step instructions on how to safely create a mouthwatering cut of pork, from the butcher block to your plate, in “Dry-Curing Pork.”
Author Hector Kent offers step-by-step instructions on how to safely create a mouthwatering cut of pork, from the butcher block to your plate, in “Dry-Curing Pork.”

From the hills of Italy to the Spanish plains, dry-cured pork has been an essential (and delicious) food source for many cultures. Microorganisms are a crucial part of dry-curing meats. Using culture for white mold on meat to get the process started can keep your meat healthy and plentiful.

All dry-cured meats are populated with an ecosystem of microorganisms, which are responsible for many of the characteristics of dry-cured meats. You may feel nervous about encouraging mold on a food that you’re ultimately going to eat, but if you want delicious dry-cured meats, you’ll need to embrace microorganisms as an important part of the process.

Without the use of chemicals to inhibit their growth, an ecosystem of mold, yeast, and bacteria will populate the outside of all drying meat. While yeast and bacteria are always present, and a salami relies on an entire ecosystem of microorganisms, mold is what you will spend most of your time managing on any piece of drying meat. As undesirable mold can be very toxic, mold management is an unavoidable part of the dry-curing process. Unwanted mold can be controlled through vigilant removal from the meat with a vinegar-soaked towel.

While you’ll usually find only a handful of different species of mold populating any piece of meat, the range of possible species is significant. Penicillium nalgiovense is the standard salami mold, with its growth easily promoted with a purchased starter culture, but it’s just one of 300 diverse molds found in the Penicillium genus. The Penicillium molds are a very important group, not just in dry-curing, but also in cheesemaking and the production of chemicals; perhaps most important, they are the original source of penicillin, the first antibiotic. Fortunately, Penicillium nalgiovense produces penicillin in such low quantities that the mold coating a piece of dry-cured meat is not a
concern to those with penicillin allergies.

Using a Mold Culture While Dry-Curing Meat

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