Charcuterie: A Guide to Prepared Meats
March 26, 2012
•Le Cordon Bleu
•Dallas
• 0 Comments
Charcuterie: A Guide to Prepared Meats
Before the icehouse, there was charcuterie. Before refrigeration, there was charcuterie. Before artificial preservatives, there was charcuterie. Which is to say that charcuterie, from the French for “cooked meat”, is a group of centuries old culinary techniques for preparing, cooking, preserving, and presenting meat products. Despite it’s ancient heritage, dating back more than 6,000 years, it remains popular throughout Europe and North America. In fact, most of today’s deli meats are charcuterie products.
Even if you’re cooking in Dallas, you’re probably using charcuterie products. That’s right. Those famous smoked sausages of Central Texas are charcuterie brought to Texas by German immigrants in the 1800s.
Italian Origins
Even though most civilizations around the world have historically had some sort of meat preservation process, typically drying or salt curing, it wasn’t until the later stages of the Roman Empire that charcuterie became a codified form of cooking and presenting food. It wasn’t known as charcuterie, however. It was, and still is, known as salumi. If that sounds similar to salami, it’s because salami are types of salumi, or Italian cured meats made primarily of pork.
Some of the most popular Italian salumi include:
- Prosciutto
- Capicola
- Bresaola
- Guanciale
- Mortadella
- Pancetta
- Salame
French Art Form
While charcuterie owes it origins to Italian salumi, it was the French who elevated the science of curing meats to an art form. During the late 14th and early 15th centuries, French chefs began experimenting with culinary techniques for the curing process for pork and other meats. Because so much salt was used to cure meat, sweet spices like cinnamon, allspice, and nutmeg were added to combat the salt’s harsh flavor. Today some of the most popular cured meat sweeteners include sugar, honey, and maple syrup.
The French also began experimenting with encasing their prepared meats in pastry crusts and emulsifiers or rendered fats. Some of the more knowledgeable people cooking in Dallas will know a famous offspring of this experimentation, beef Wellington, where beef tenderloin is cooked inside puff pastry and served with a savory pan sauce.
One of the biggest innovations made during this time was the introduction of forcemeats or mixtures of ground meat and fat. Today, most charcuterie is made of some type of forcemeat made from game meat, poultry, pork, seafood, and other proteins like liver.
Some of the most popular charcuterie include:
- Pâté
- Terrine
- Galantine
- Roulade
- Fromage de Tête (Head Cheese)
- Rillette
- Crépinette
Other Cultures and Charcuterie
Eventually salumi and charcuterie techniques began to spread throughout the rest of Europe, where each culture applied the techniques to their local natural resources. From Germany came the Frankfurter. From Poland came kielbasa. From Spain came chorizo. Eventually the techniques came to the New World in the form of cured and smoked hams, jerky, and meatloaf. Yes, your grandma’s meatloaf is actually charcuterie!
Charcuterie Today
Today most charcuterie, at least in the U.S., is consumed as deli meat. Common meats include bologna, liverwurst, pepperoni, salami, pimento loaf, and Braunschweiger, among many others.
Bacon and hot dogs are the most popular charcuterie products in the U.S. today. And a bacon-wrapped hot dog?
This article is presented by Le Cordon Bleu College of Culinary Arts in Dallas. Le Cordon Bleu College of Culinary Arts in Dallas offers culinary arts and pâtisserie and baking training programs in Dallas, Texas. To learn more about the class offerings, please visit Chefs.edu/Dallas for more information.
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