Food

Hungarian Winter Salami (Téliszalámi)

Charcuterie · Cured · Fermented · Hungarian · Pork · Sausage · Smoked Foods

Hungarian Winter Salami (Téliszalámi)
Prep 2 hours
Cook None — fermented, cold-smoked, mould-ripened and dried for at least 90 days
Serves About 3.1 lb / 1.4 kg finished — two or three salamis
Level Hard

Hungary’s great fine-grained dry salami: a long, thick pork salami cut very fine, seasoned mostly with white pepper and allspice, cold-smoked for about two weeks and then ripened for three months under a grey-white coat of noble mould. Two names are protected. Szegedi szalámi (or Szegedi téliszalámi) is a PDO, registered in 2007 and made by Pick in Szeged. Budapesti téliszalámi is a PGI, registered in 2009 and made by Herz within a kilometre of the Danube. The grey-white mould and the allspice are the diagnostic details. This is not a paprika sausage in the Csabai sense, and it is nothing like the collection’s “Hungarian Sausage”, which is a fresh paprika grind for frying.

It is called winter salami because until refrigerated drying rooms arrived in the late 1950s it could only be made in the cold months. It is eaten raw, so every safety step matters: Cure #2, a starter culture, a pH check, mould you added on purpose rather than mould that turned up, and a weighed loss of 35–40%. The formula follows Marianski’s Szegedi and the Budapesti PGI schedule. I have not made it, and it is untested as written.

Ingredients

MEAT BLOCK (2,270 g / 5 lb), % of meat weight

  • 1,590 g (3 lb 8 oz) lean pork from ham and shoulder, all sinew removed — 70%
  • 680 g (1 lb 8 oz) hard pork back fat — 30%

CURE, SALT AND CULTURES (% of meat weight)

  • 64 g salt (2.8%)
  • 5.7 g Cure #2 (2.5 g/kg = 156 ppm nitrite plus nitrate)
  • 4.5 g dextrose (0.2%)
  • 0.6 g Bactoferm T-SPX starter culture, in 30 ml distilled water
  • 1 dose Penicillium nalgiovense mould culture (Mould 600), as the packet directs

SPICE (% of meat weight)

  • 5.7 g white pepper (0.25%)
  • 4.5 g ground allspice (0.2%)
  • 11 g sweet Hungarian paprika (0.5%)
  • 1.1 g fresh-grated nutmeg (0.05%)
  • 60–65 mm beef middle or fibrous casing, in 45 cm lengths

Directions

Key ingredients

Allspice · Black Pepper · Cheese Cultures (Mesophilic & Thermophilic)

  1. In the collection: lean pork from a mature pig, hard back fat, white pepper and allspice — and two cultures, one inside and one outside. The collection’s other long-dried salamis are Salami and Chorizo Español (Dry-Cured Spanish Chorizo).
  2. Freeze the fat hard: the fine “rice-grain” look of a winter salami needs the fat at about −4 °C / 25 °F and the meat just above freezing. Fat that is merely cold smears at a 3 mm plate.
  3. Grind fine: everything through a 3 mm plate, fat last. Weigh the Cure #2 on a 0.01 g scale; wake the T-SPX in distilled water.
  4. Mix: salt, cure, dextrose, culture and spices, mixed only until sticky. Over-mixing warms it and smears the fat.
  5. Stuff: very tight into the soaked casing, no air. Tie, prick any pockets, weigh and tag one salami.
  6. Ferment: hang at 18–20 °C / 64–68 °F and about 90% humidity for 72 hours. A low, slow ferment gives a milder salami; this one is meant to taste of pork and allspice, not sourness.
  7. Check the pH — do not skip this: after fermentation the pH must read 5.3 or lower on a meat pH meter. If it has not dropped, the culture failed. Do not move it to the drying chamber; a raw sausage that sat warm without acidifying can carry staphylococcal toxin that drying does not remove. Cook it to 71 °C / 160 °F and eat it as a cooked sausage, or discard it.
  8. Add the mould: mix the Mould 600 in distilled water as directed and spray or dip the salamis right after fermentation. Seeding a known white Penicillium is how you make sure the coat is the right one; the Hungarian factories rely on a house flora built up over a century, which a new chamber does not have.
  9. Cold smoke for about two weeks: the Budapesti PGI smokes for 12–20 days over smouldering hardwood. At home, give short sessions (2–4 hours) of cool beech smoke below 15 °C / 59 °F every day or two over the first two weeks, keeping the humidity up between sessions so the mould still grows.
  10. Ripen and dry: hang at 12–14 °C / 54–57 °F and 80–86% humidity, easing toward 75% over the months. The mould should cover the casing evenly in grey-white. Ready at no less than 90 days from stuffing and 35–40% weight loss. Green or black mould can be wiped off with vinegar if it is a spot; fuzzy coloured mould over a large area, slime, or an ammonia smell means discard.
  11. Serve: sliced paper-thin, raw, with bread. Store whole, wrapped in paper, in the fridge.

Notes

Where this recipe came from — and what it isn’t. The schedule is from the Budapesti téliszalámi PGI as transcribed by Qualigeo: pigs over 150 kg and at least a year old; salt, sodium nitrate, white pepper, sweet paprika and allspice; smoked over smouldering hardwood for 12–20 days; fermented and dried at 10–14 °C and above 86% humidity, with natural Penicillium and Aspergillus mould and no starter cultures; at least 90 days from filling; 4–8.5 cm diameter; allspice-dominant flavour. Quantities are Marianski’s Szegedi téliszalámi (meatsandsausages.com): pork 700, fat 300, salt 30, Cure #2 2.5, white pepper 2, sweet paprika 10, allspice 2, nutmeg 1 per kg; 3 mm; 65 mm casing; cold smoke at 12 °C over beech 12–14 days; 16 °C at 86–90% for mould, then 2–3 months. Deviations, numbered: (1) A starter culture, dextrose and a pH target are added, and the ferment starts warmer (18–20 °C), because a home chamber lacks the factories’ established flora. (2) The mould is seeded (Penicillium nalgiovense) instead of left to arrive. (3) Paprika is halved to 0.5%, closer to the allspice-led flavour the PGI describes; Marianski’s 1% is the alternative. (4) Salt is 2.8%, a little under Marianski’s 3.0%. UNTESTED.

Where téliszalámi came from. Márk Pick founded his business in Szeged in 1869 (the company’s own date), and Italian salami makers were brought in — production on a larger scale is dated to 1883 by later accounts. Herz began in Budapest at the end of the 19th century. Both depended on winter: the long cold smoke and slow mould ripening only worked in cold months until refrigerated chambers came in during the late 1950s, after which the name stayed and the season went. Szegedi szalámi became an EU PDO in 2007; Budapesti téliszalámi a PGI in 2009.

The name. Téliszalámi: winter salami. Szegedi and Budapesti name the two protected origins. “Hungarian salami” in English nearly always means this type.

Variations. Mangalica téliszalámi: from Mangalica pork, fattier and sweeter. Paprika-coated salamis are a different, newer Hungarian product. The Szegedi (Pick) and Budapesti (Herz) salamis differ in texture and density; both are allspice-and-pepper salamis under white mould.

Sourcing and gear. A drying chamber that can hold 12–14 °C and 75–86% humidity for three months is the whole project. A cold smoke generator. A pH meter. Mould 600 (Penicillium nalgiovense) and T-SPX from sausage-supply houses. Ham from an older, heavier pig is drier and better for this than supermarket pork.

Still open. The Szegedi PDO specification text was not read (the EUR-Lex page did not render), so its exact spice list is not confirmed. Pick’s 1869 date and the Italian-workers story come from the company and later retellings.

The photo. The photograph is a Hungarian salami with its white mould coat, from Commons’ Hungarian salami category; the brand is not identified.

Read more on the site. What Is a Sausage?