Yogourt as starter culture in sausage making

Igor Duńczyk
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Post by Igor Duńczyk » Fri Feb 28, 2014 20:17

Hi Chris!
Thrilling! It looks as if it´s headed in the right direction - apart from the initial steeep pH drop, with T-SPX lacking behind (in a good sense).
For sure the jogurth incubated salami won´t need a higher start temperature than the one with starter culture, if you repeat the experience.
What I am curious to know once you are ready for slicing, is if the staphylococcus had a chance to contribute to the color formation. Did you use cure #1 or #2 ?
Wishing you a Good Day!
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Post by redzed » Sun Mar 02, 2014 00:29

Hi Igor,

Well I did do a repeat test and tried fermenting at a lower temp, but the pH got stuck after 18hrs, so I bumped up the temp. I made a spicy salami with 40% duck breasts, so a bit of tang probably will be OK. See my post and report above. I used cure 2 and cured the cubed meat for 48 hrs before processing. All seems to be coming along well, entirely covered with mould. The taste of the salami, especially when compared with the T-SPX batch will be interesting.
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Post by redzed » Sat Mar 08, 2014 20:35

After 18 days the probiotic salami is progressing well. There is almost no difference in the weight loss (around 21%) between the two probiotic and the one T-SPX samples. They are all still somewhat soft to the touch, so I lowered the humidity, to around 75%. pH has risen in all 3 samples as well. Readings are below. The first number is today's, second number is 6 days following fermentation and the third is immediately after the fermentation stage.
Batch 1 Probiotic powder: 4.90; 4.60; 4.95
Batch 2 Probiotic yogourt: 5.14; 4.63; 4.62
Batch 3 T-SPX: 5.35; 4.95; 5.12

Test batch 4, made with different meat a few days later, and fermented with yogourt is also showing excellent progress. pH is steady and since some of the salami are in 40mm hog casings, it's firming up and will probably be the first to go under the knife.

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Post by Carpster » Sun Mar 09, 2014 05:22

Too Sa-weet looking!!! I have never made fermented sausage (on purpose).
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Post by alhunter63 » Mon Mar 10, 2014 01:13

Wow, that looks yummy!! The one way over to the right looks like it has a dark greenish mold on it or is it just the lighting??
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Post by redzed » Mon Mar 10, 2014 06:32

Nah, no green mold on it or any gray black or fuzzy stuff to be found in the chamber. Too much Penicillium nalgiovense in there to give anything else a chance. The pic below is of the sausage you were wondering about.

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Post by Igor Duńczyk » Mon Mar 31, 2014 22:56

Hi Cris!
How is the development? You have been curiously silent for the last couple of weeks. So has I - but that´s because of a load of business visits to polish meat-processors and testing out some new SACCO starter cultures.

What specially interests me is how color development has been as compared with the T-SPX standard :shock:
Wishing you a Good Day!
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Post by redzed » Tue Apr 01, 2014 15:38

Hi Igor,
All three test salami are drying nicely, but are still a bit soft when I squeeze them. I did cut into the one started with yogourt a few days ago and it tasted great. As far as the colour, it's appears to be a bit pale, but I will wait to see how it compares with the T-SPX sample. I will provide a full report this weekend when I will cut into the other two. The one thing that concerns me is that I had really high pH readings on both probiotic samples. No 1, (probiotic powder read 6.8, No. 2, (yogourt), 6.65, while T-SPX was 5.6. I realize that a rise in pH is normal at this stage, but these reading are higher than the starting pH of 5.8.
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Post by Diced » Sat Apr 05, 2014 02:47

I eagerly await your results Redzed. I am looking to make my first batch of salami and am planning on using yoghurt. I would love to have some direct comparison between yoghurt and commercial starters before i start to give me confidence in using yoghurt!
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Post by redzed » Sun Apr 06, 2014 22:02

After 46 days since the probiotic vs. T-PX salami experiment was started, the day of reckoning has finally arrived. Unfortunately I did not weigh the sausages at start so that I could determine the amount of moisture loss. I got so used to not doing that, that I simply forgot. I can tell whether the salami is ready by looking at it and giving it a squeeze. The weight and number of days don't really matter to me. It is ready when it's ready.
Let's take a step back for those who have not been following this thread. I made one batch of finnochionna salami, divided it into three parts and fermented No. 1 with a probiotic powder extracted from 6 capsules of a nutritional supplement. The powder weighed 6.1g, containing lactobacillus. casei, l. rhamnosus, l.acidophilus, l. plantarum, l. helveticus. No. 2 was the yogourt sample. I used two brands: the first, 4 tablespoons of Balkan style organic 1% fat yogourt, containing lactobacillus d. bulgaricus, l.acidophilus, bifidobacterium sp., l. p. casei, l. rhamnosus, p.f. shermani. From the second yogourt I used 2 tablespoons of Balkan style natural 0% fat yogourt, containing l.acidophilus, bifidobacterium, and l. paracasei. No.3 sample was fermented with Bactoferm T-SPX.
All three samples turned out well on the technical side, that is, each one dried well, has excellent binding properties, nice texture and pleasant mouthfeel. As far as the colour, there does not appear to be any difference between the two probiotic samples and the T-SPX sample. This is surprising since T-SPX contains the bacteria Staphyllococcus Xylous which is supposed to aid in the salami having that attractive red colour. All three are almost identical, with the possible exception of No. 2, the yogourt sample that seems to not have dried as much as the other two at this point in time. And to my great surprise, there is almost no detectable difference in taste! No 1 and Number 2 are truly identical, while to me No. 3 (T-SPX) might have a bit more flavour. By that I mean that the spices come to the front just a little bit better. But I did a blind test with three friends, and none of them could tell any difference between any of the samples. They concluded that it was the same product!

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Salami after 46 days.


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No discernible difference in colour or any other outward appearance in the three samples.

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Salami sample No. 1, probiotic powder

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Salami sample No. 2, yogourt

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Salami Sample No. 3, Bactoferm T-SPX
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Post by crustyo44 » Mon Apr 07, 2014 07:14

Hi Red,
Congratulations on such an informative series of posts. What you did is absolutely fabulous.
For many people around the world, cultures are beyond their reach, either in monetary terms or shipping terms, I am thinking about culture temperatures in transit.
You will go down in the sausage fermenting history as a tenacious experimenter and be remembered all around the world, especially in un-developed areas.
Red for President is what these guys usually say south of the Border??
Cheers,
Jan.
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Post by el Ducko » Mon Apr 07, 2014 14:33

So, having never made salami before, do you think an amateur sausage maker like me with no fermented sausage experience could use yoghurt culture and an UMAi bag and a garage refrigerator to make this sort of thing?

I'm very tempted to try, but would like the benefit of your experience. I've always wanted to try it, but CW's remarks about temperature during shipment (mainly during our nomadic lifestyle), plus my own lack of equipment for temperature + humidity control, has stopped me in the past.
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Post by redzed » Mon Apr 07, 2014 18:46

My experiments are far from being scientific, but did result in showing that using probiotic cultures can lower the pH of commutated meat and alter it in a way that produces a consumable product. But a few things need to be pointed out. The yogourt I used was not selected at random. I searched far and wide and went to several grocery and health food stores to find fresh yogourt that contained active cultures. From the available scientific literature I learned that the following Lactic Acid Bacteria (LAB) have been successfully used in fermenting sausages: l. rhamnosus, l. casei/paracasei, l. plantarum and bifidobacterium lactis. The yogourt I used contained one or more of these cultures, as did the Costco brand of probiotic capsules. These cultures are able to survice the nitriMy experiment also showed that fermenting with probiotics in powder form worked just as well, or maybe even better than with with yogourt. The yogourt sample did not dry as fast as the other two samples, although that did not affect the taste or other qualities of the sausage. I also successfully made yogourt with pasteurized milk using the same probiotic powder.

In an extension of this experiment I made another sausage a Spicy Duck Salami using yogourt. Here I learned that the sausage needs to be fermented at a temperature higher than 25°C. There was very minimal pH drop at 21°, and a rapid drop once the temp was raised to 27-28.
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Post by redzed » Mon Apr 07, 2014 19:12

el Ducko wrote:So, having never made salami before, do you think an amateur sausage maker like me with no fermented sausage experience could use yoghurt culture and an UMAi bag and a garage refrigerator to make this sort of thing?
That is a good question! I would definitely try it! As I indicated in my other posts, certain lactic bacteria found in yogourt will successfully ferment the sausage. But you still need to carry out the fermentation in a controlled environment, 28-30C and 90% RH. The permeable UMAi bag will probably work in the drying process.

But rather than using yogourt, why not probiotic powder? There is also a Korean study where kimchi was used successfully to ferment sausage.
http://www.deepdyve.com/lp/elsevier/the ... %3Dsausage
Kimchi contains l.curvatus, l.sakei, l.brevis and l. plantarum, the same bacteria that is found in commercial starter cultures. And you can get Kimchi powder in health food stores.
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Post by el Ducko » Tue Apr 08, 2014 04:24

redzed wrote:That is a good question! I would definitely try it! As I indicated in my other posts, certain lactic bacteria found in yogourt will successfully ferment the sausage. But you still need to carry out the fermentation in a controlled environment, 28-30C and 90% RH. The permeable UMAi bag will probably work in the drying process.

But rather than using yogourt, why not probiotic powder?...
UhOh! It's starting to get complicated, again.

I think I'll hold off until I can use the real ingredients in a controllable environment. The summer sausage turned out great, but isn't nearly as exotic (or demanding) as a good salami. You guys are getting my appetite for fermented sausages stimulated, though. Maybe I need to save up and break down and take the plunge and whatever other trite excuses I can think up. Thanks for all the experimental work. As they say, "Inquiring Minds Want to Know."
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