Gooooood evening 
Anyway, fantastic news! After the long awaited and continued cleaning of our hanging Salami they were firm enough to harvest. I think they could have done for another week but they're fine and safe to eat. Noting that I pulled them down yesterday and ate..... two already. I know right! Supposed to last the summer but it's probably bearly going to get us through the rest of the winter 🤣
It don't look like much and it's alot less than what we would typically make but due to restrictions we couldn't have anyone over at that time to help so it was just me and little miss labouring away for a few hours each day to get the job done.
So now that we have pulled them down there is only one thing left to do and that's prep them for storage and there are two ways of doing this. Traditionally we would put them into a bucket of oil and store in a cool dry place. The oil we'd use was olive oil as it seems to have prevented anything from growing in it. But not the healthiest option.
These days we crypvac them and store them in the fridge although my mum keeps hers in the cupboard, I'm not sure about what's the best option or safest but I know fridges are safe? Or at least the safest option. Well, haven't gotten sick yet so we're all good I hope.
I picked up this lil baby from K-Mart a few years ago and it's been a nifty little contraption. You can pick them up relatively cheap and if you're intending on making your own Salami anything big enough to not eat in one go I would definitely recommend buying one of these.
Lil Miss and I spent a lil while working away ensuring all the packages were air tight, it's a really great product seal's the bags and all. Can be used for other things too that require airtight. But I only rip this bad boy out for Salami as it's quite plastic intensive.
So onto the important thing, how did they turn out? Well I don't think I had them hanging in the best spot as some have come out really good and others not so mature yet. All safe to eat, my mum was over on the weekend and I gave her some and she commented that they were the best I had made and they reminded her of my nonnas. My nonna used to pull them down when they were still soft and my mum tends to think I dry mine out too much.
I prefer them a little firmer where my mum says Salami isn't ment to be too tough, it's a soft meat. She has given them an A+ this year.
There's a general rule of thumb when it comes to Salami and that there shouldn't be any air cavities. As you can see with mine they are whole. This is why pricking the skins and removing air bubbles are important. It hollows out and you can find yourself in trouble as that's there bacteria can grow.
The first one I removed and tried I thought would have has a hole in it as I thought there was too much air and wasn't filled enough when I was making it. I was correct and it was hollow in parts.
I did still eat it, I tend to eat all of it. But I've been making it for decades. If you do it in the right temperature and allow the meat to foment you're usually OK. If it was bad it would smell bad and given we are in winter and my garage has been below 5 degrees Celsius, botulism wouldn't have had survived. But do keep that in mind.
Typically you want to make it in the coldest month where temperatures done exceed 14 - 15 degrees Celsius and nights are around 4 - 5 degrees Celsius.
