Opinions about fresh beef bung

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wasuky
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Opinions about fresh beef bung

Post by wasuky » Mon Nov 16, 2020 17:23

As I always start my post... I am not an expert (or anywhere near) in fact I have 0,05% experience, where that 0,05% was earned in the past few months attempting to make a mortadella with citric acid (not ECA), drying a salami in the fridge with no temp/humidity control and drying a spanish chorizo in the same fridge with a non-calibrated sensor (it was reading 75% RH but it was actually reading 50%).

I'm about to finish an arduino temp/humidity controller and I want my first project to be a small coppa. I have been struggling to find large casings as in my country (Venezuela) dry meats are not common (not common beyond the few dry sausages found in special supermarkets (which by the way are awful... the dry sausages, I mean)).

Anyway I came to know that a friend works in a slaughter house (I'm pretty sure that's not the right word) and he got me 3 fresh beef bung (there were holes all over the thing, but can't complain since it costed $0).

Now, I tried to clean the things yesterday but since I couldn't find any information about the right process I did it anyway and found 4 things.

1- I couldn't trim the external fat in 100%. It was so hard to do it without cutting the thing itself that made me think that removing 100% of the fat by hand was almost impossible. I tried to scape it with the dull side of the knife but saw that I was breaking the thing.

2- There is a external white memabrane that peeled off like plastic. No idea if that was necessary. The next membrane was almost impossible to remove so I didn't try it.

3- Found some black spots in the inside 2 of the bungs. The spots are black, tough and if I prick it or press it with my fingers (like a pimple), somethin yellow popped out. It made me think that maybe both animals were not healthy and that I should not use those casings, but I thought of asking you guys who do know about this. If I scrap these spots they go away but they do leave an almost impercetible black mark and also, to scrap them off I have to put a bit of force on the knife.
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Re: Opinions about fresh beef bung

Post by wasuky » Mon Nov 16, 2020 17:27

RIght now the bugs are in the fridge in a water/vinegar/salt solution. Last time I cleaned a regular hog casing for sausage found out that vinegar kinda blanched it, so now I use it (again, not sure if it's necessary).

I'll post a picture today to show how the bungs turn out after 24hrs in the solution. And well... I'll toss them out or not depending on what you guys say.
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Re: Opinions about fresh beef bung

Post by Butterbean » Tue Nov 17, 2020 16:18

I've cleaned my own casings before but am by no means an expert. It sounds like you have done about all you can do. Normally, I pull the fat off the bungs by hand then give a light scrape with the back of the knife. I've used vinegar and baking soda to clean deer rumens and this seems to work pretty good leaving a snowy white casing when done. Don't know what this mixture does as it is a big contradiction in pH and foams quite a bit but it does seem to lift the hairs off the rumen well but I've never tried this on a bung. Normally on a bung I'll do as you do and clean it in a vinegar solution then I'll salt it good and refrigerate. I've found after you do this the rest of the fat streaks will come right off for the most part. Don't know what to think about the black spots but suspect if its a worm cyst or something like that the salting and drying should fix that in short order and I personally wouldn't worry much about it.
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Re: Opinions about fresh beef bung

Post by wasuky » Thu Nov 19, 2020 20:55

So we could say that it doesn't take to much effort to clean it to keep it safe? I mean, just

1- peel off the external membrane (which it's easy),
2- pull off the fat by hand (also easy),
3- give it a light scrape with the back of the knife (I did this but went too hard and kinda tore it up a bit),
4- turn it inside out and scrap until there are no trace of green-yellow-brown colour or it's not sticky anymore,
5- give it a good rinse
6- soak it for hours (don't know how many so I left it 24hrs) in water, vinegar and salt (and bicarbonate? maybe)
7- salt it and to the fridge

I have never cleaned bungs (never have cleaned any kind of casing) before and never seen nobody do it so I find it hard to know how hard should I go when scraping, what membrane to remove, what to cut, what to toss away, should I go deeper or harder?

Anyway...thanks Butterbean.

oh! Two more things...

1- about the holes I couldn't help making (not on purpose, of course). Can I sew them up?
2- Is there any book/video/blog/etc where I can find info about how to dehydrate these casings? A know a guy in another city who told me he dehydrate bungs to sell them to 2 neighbors (one German and the other Polish). I am 100% sure he doesn't have any kind of machine or whatever to do it. I've been trying to find the "DIY" way but can't find anything.
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Re: Opinions about fresh beef bung

Post by Butterbean » Thu Nov 19, 2020 23:17

Dehydrating the casings is easy. Just pack in salt and let stand in a colander over a bowl. Occasionally just fluff the mass and add more salt and when you feel the texture change you can either hang them or stick them in a bucket and put in the fridge.

When you are scraping them all you are trying to do is remove the film. Its a gelatinous film. With pig casings you can actually do this quite well with your fingers squeezing in on the casing or even better with a rag. Pig casings clean right easily though. Worst part is getting started with the evacuation of the contents. After that its quite easy.

I only use the bicarbonate on stomaches because there is a hairy layer inside the stomach that you have to remove. I think the bicarbonate acts as both a tenderizer to help remove this layer and an abrasive to help scratch this layer off and some sort of psychological thing for the mind's eye because this starts out rather gross but before long you have a beautiful white casing that looks clean enough to kiss.

For reasons such as this I keep a 50 lb bag of swimming pool salt in the shop. Its 100% salt produced by the same manufacturer who makes the other salts but it only costs about $6 for the 50# bag. I use this liberally.

Again, I'm not expert on this but have cleaned a fair amount of casings and like you mention a man could make a few bucks if they had a market for casings and didn't mind cleaning them. Its a nasty job but its really not that bad once you get past the first slinging and if you have access to the entrails you could make some good money I'd think because casings can be expensive.

I imagine you could sew the holes or work around them and small nicks may not even pose a problem. You could also get your hands on some of the caul fat and use this to wrap things. I don't know. Just thinking out loud.
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