Encapsulated Citric Acid

[Weekend Smoker]

Austin I found the answer in your video.

[mrobisr]

Weekend Smoker Sodium erythorbate is the industry standand when you want to go straight to the smoker from stuffing. Walton’s also carries https://waltons.com/smoked-meat-stabilizer/ for processing of wild game though I have never used it.

[Austin]

Weekend Smoker ECA allows you to smoke immediately. If you see something from someone else to the contrary, they are wrong. ECA held in a product overnight can lead to the encapsulate dissolving and then the releasing of citric acid at the wrong time will lead to a crumbly and unappealing product. Safe to eat, but not a good product visually and not good texture.
mrobisr Is correct on the Sodium Erythorbate. Smoked Meat Stabilizer is a great substitute for Sodium Erythorbate and easier to measure out quantities because they are not such minuscule amounts as Sodium Erythorbate. Just cannot use Smoked Meat Stabilizer in a brine/cure solution. Only use Smoked Meat Stabilizer in sausage, not brines or cure solutions.

[Weekend Smoker]

Austin I believe you. The pic attached is why I asked, a coworker showed it to me. I was looking for some before the weekend but now I need more time to figure this out. My reason for inquiring about the encapsulated citric acid is I want to make my sticks as close to shelf stable as possible, I don’t want to add “Tang” to the sticks. So if I read your post correctly I should use your Cure Excellerator to achieve my goal?

[Austin]

Weekend Smoker if you are trying to make shelf stable, you need to add ECA at a rate of 4 oz per 25 lb of meat. If you don’t add ECA, your chances of getting to shelf stability a lot low. I would use Smoke Meat Stabilizer then as a cure accelerator if you don’t use ECA.
Getting to shelf stable is mainly about acidity and water activity. Without the acidity control with ECA and only going off water activity, you have to be so low on water activity that you will have a product more like jerky if you are going for shelf stable. It will be pretty dry one way or another. Testing that too becomes difficult unless you want to pay a lot for a water activity meter.

[Weekend Smoker]

Austin If I use the ECA and don’t want the tang what do you recommend to add to it? A local place here uses corn syrup. I don’t want to use that. I thought I saw something in your store that said it would eliminate the Tang but the name escapes me.

[Jonathon]

Weekend Smoker Sodium Erythorbate is the best thing to use to accelerate the cure and not get any tang. Smoked Meat Stabilizer is another option, but it does add a little tang, just not as much as the Encapsulated Citric Acid

With the Sodium Erythorbate, just be careful, 7/8 of an 0z is enough to accelerate the cure for 100 lb of meat (4 oz of sure cure) so you have to have an accurate scale.

[Weekend Smoker]

Wow! I am currently doing 12lb runs and shortly moving to 25lb runs. I need a really good scale.

[bocephus]

Weekend Smoker An accurate scale sure makes things easier.

[fullmetaljerky]

Austin Is it safe to say that as long as you use an appropriate amount of ECA or a Smoked Meat stabilizer, and stick to the recipes you have, that the PH and water activity would allow the product to be shelf stable? If not, how could I make sure my product was without spending $400 on a water activity meter?

I would hate to go through the process of making snack sticks that in the end I was treating like hot dogs.

[samspade]

Without the water activity meter and ph you can never be sure its shelf stable. You bag and vac and refrigerate or freeze.

[Dave in AZ]

fullmetaljerky what samspade said. There are a few recipes in books like Marianski that discuss how long things are air dried, or start to finish weight, to guesstimate shelf stability. The Marianski books on salami give some good ph and weight loss standards to arrive at safe products. I bought a pH meter for this myself, and target 40% weight loss on salami for stability.

[Austin]

fullmetaljerky There is no way to be sure without doing a process, testing it, and then repeating the exact process every time. You can guess, but that is something I can’t help with for liability reasons.

[processhead]

fullmetaljerky
Just process it and then play it safe by packaging and keeping it refrigerated.
You could pull a packaged sample and store it at room temperature for observation in the name of science, but keep the rest refrigerated or frozen and enjoy it.

[mrobisr]

Weekend Smoker said in Encapsulated Citric Acid:

Wow! I am currently doing 12lb runs and shortly moving to 25lb runs. I need a really good scal

Sodium Erythorbate
5lbs meat
1.2 g

Per pound of meat
.24 g

[Weekend Smoker]

mrobisr Just got my scale and the Sodium Erythorbate. I will make the first run tomorrow. Thank you.