equilibrium brining


 
j biesinger

j biesinger

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I had a piece of pork loin that I was avoiding and didn't feel like dealing with, so I thought a nice long brine was in my best interest.

Normally when I dry cure pork, I use 2-2.5% salt per weight of meat. I doubled the amount here and went with a 5% salt solution. The solution was also 5% sugar and included some cure #1. The loin sat for 7 days in the brine.

I found the results to be rather interesting:

1) the loin seemed cured to the center, a few parts weren't fully cured but I suspect it was were the loin was touching the bucket sides(I wasn't too diligent about overhauling).

2) despite being a 5% brine, the loin was very mildly salty.

3) the pork fried up and was incredibly tender and moist.

I'm most curious about why it wasn't saltier, and why the finished texture was so different than my typical 48 brine cure.

For full disclosure, half of the loin was smoked and half was rolled in cornmeal for Canadian peameal bacon.

IMG_2697.JPG
 
Last couple of loins I did (wet) were about a 3.5% brine and they went close to 14 days. They were great. Wonder at 7 days (regardless of the brine strength) if that was actually long enough to reach a homeostasis condition?
 
I've only done one wet-brine but it was for seasoning meat i.e. ham hocks so I had it on the salty side and didn't pay too much care to the levels of salt in it when I was making it - I used cup measurements.

For an equilibrium brine, is the method to calculate total salt weight desired in the meat as a % of the weight of the water+meat and scale the seasoning from there?
 
For an equilibrium brine, is the method to calculate total salt weight desired in the meat as a % of the weight of the water+meat and scale the seasoning from there?
Click to expand...
That's my understanding.
 
For an equilibrium brine, is the method to calculate total salt weight desired in the meat as a % of the weight of the water+meat and scale the seasoning from there?
Click to expand...

I was talking through the problem with someone and I realized one mistake was that I did not include the meat weight into my solution concentration. Even still I can't imagine my meat weighed more than the water, leaving my concentration higher than the 2% I normally use.

I agree, 7 days wasn't probably enough, that combined with the lower concentration was probably the cause of lower than anticipated saltyness.

what I'm most curious about was the moistness and texture of the final product. I'm wondering if a highly concentrated, short brine pulls moisture out and there's not enough time to bring some back in. Its like doing a dry cure and stopping the cure while the bag still has liquid in it. Letting the meat pull moisture back in might be the key.
 
Jeff,
Are you sure that the meat weight factors in when doing a cure to equilibrium? Not doubting. Just have never compensated for it with a long cure.

"if a highly concentrated, short brine pulls moisture out and there's not enough time to bring some back in."
That makes sense to me but I've never done many short brines except maybe for the occasional scallop or shrimp.
 
Are you sure that the meat weight factors in when doing a cure to equilibrium? Not doubting. Just have never compensated for it with a long cure.
Click to expand...

dunno. I think it would, if you wanted everything in the bucket to be the same concentration. then again, if the solution is moving through the meat, then maybe that's good enough.
 
If I look at Len Poli's introduction when talking about a wet cure for fermented sausage he bases his ppm calculations on both the water and meat. If you figure in equalibrium brining you'd shoot for an even distribution then it would make sense to include all ingredients.

For Thanksgiving I brined a turkey for turkey confit and it's in the water bath right now. I did add cure #1 and brined for 8 days at a 170ppm of Nitrite. The salt was about a 3.5% but the brine was based on the Apple Juice brine which isn't that salty either.
 
The Modernist Cuisine book has a bit of information on equilibrium brining. According to the authors, your starting volume (or weight) should include the meat and the water (bone should not be counted). Water volume should be as large as possible, or as close to two times the weight of the meat as your container can hold. They also suggest a 1% salt level, which I feel is pretty low.

Starting with a bone in pork loin that weighed 2.4 kg (I did not subtract any weight for the rib bones), I made 4.8 kg (2x meat) of brine.

Following another MC recipe for pink brine, I added 0.14% cure #1 or 10g.

To make a 2% salt solution, I needed 144g salt. I added 135g, assuming the cure is 90% salt, so 9g had already been added.

To the brine, I added:

11g Juniper
2g coriander seed
6g lemon zest
6g orange zest
3g cinnamon
35g fresh ginger
1.5g allspice

The loin sat in the solution for 6 days before rinsing and drying. It dried in a fridge overnight before smoking.

Before smoking, it was very moist, lightly salted, and prominent flavors were of citrus.

After smoking, citrus and juniper were the key flavors.

I'm really excited about this. It seems like equilibrium brining has huge advantages over highly concentrated brines. 1) it's precise and each one of my ingredients can be scaled since they are all percents based on quantity of meat (not just quantity of solution). 2) it's not as time dependent, and runs longer, giving all the flavors time to penetrate the meat. 3) you are using less ingredients. 4) you never have to worry about over salted meat.

I'm guessing the downside is safety. There's probably a risk of spoilage, since the salt concentration isn't high enough to discourage bacterial growth.
 
I've done a lot of work with equilibrium brining and came up with my own definition to, hopefully, make it easier to understand for those new to the idea.

Equilibrium brining is a method of brining that makes it impossible to over-salt or over-cure meat when using a reasonable percentage of salt and the proper amount of cure. In equilibrium brining the submerged meat and the cover brine (or cover brine and injected brine, in larger pieces of meat) act as a single system and are considered a single unit when calculating salt, sugar and cure amounts. Over time, the ingredients in the brine migrate into the meat until levels in the meat tissue and in the brine are balanced via osmosis and diffusion. Therefore, the calculation for ingoing salt, sugar and cure is based on the weight of the meat plus the weight of the water or other liquid used in the brine.

I've found that it also works well with larger pieces of mea tbut they need to be injected, and a high ratio of meat to liquid (4:1,2:1, etc.) should be used for best results. I've also created a free javascipt Universal Cure Calculator to make the calculations easy (I'm not sure if I'm allowed to post a link to the calculator.)

Here's an example of a 2:1 ratio (meat:water) equilibrium brining project.

We'll do immersion cured (rind-off) bacon which requires no more than 120ppm nitrite.

Our piece of bacon weighs 1000 grams so the amount of water required for our 2:1 brine is 500grams, adding the two together we get 1500grams.
We now calculate the cure, salt and sugar for a total of 1500 grams of meat and water.
Our bacon is less than 2-1/2 inches thick so injecting isn't required.

Here's the results from the calculator (screen capture):

354x388px-LL-50ba7175_calculatorexample.png


Here's another example:

I typically do 2:1 or even 4:1 brines, but here's another example, a 1:1 ratio equilibrium brine for corned beef.

A 2-1/2 inch thick, 1000gram piece of brisket, requiring 200ppm nitrite and 1000grams of water.
Total of the meat and water 2000grams.

Screen capture:
353x385px-LL-f6e9924b_calculatortwo.png


Maximum safe nitrite limits for various methods of curing can be found in the USDA's Processing Inspectors' Calculations Handbook.

www.fsis.usda.gov/OPPDE/rdad/FSISDirectives/7620-3.pdf

Please be sure that you understand the technical and safety issues involved.
It's especially important to understand what's meant by 'dry cured' in the handbook, the associated ppm numbers do not apply to short term curing.

It's important to remember that in equilibrium brining a 1:1 brine works good for small piece of meat, but a strong brine like a 2:1 brine or stronger and pumping works best for larger pieces of meat.

That's the way I've done it for years influenced by ancestors and that's what's customary in others parts of the world too.

This is from the Marianski's......

"In Poland where people have smoked meats for hundreds of years, almost everybody (meats plants included) uses the following weight ratio: from 30 % to 40 % of water to 100 % of meat. That means that for 1 kg (2.2 lbs) of meat we add 0.4 liters (400 mg) of water. Keep in mind that 1 liter of water weighs exactly 1 kg."

Have fun!

~Martin :cool:

Edited to add: Link to the Universal Cure Calculator: http://www.diggingdogfarm.com/page2.html
 
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