Molto Gusto_ Easy Italian Cooking - Mario Batali [12]
PROSCIUTTO CRUDO DOLCE is the general term for an air-dried salt-cured ham made from pigs that weigh in at around 350 pounds. The hams are generally hung, after a traditional salting process, for at least 300 days, often for up to 24 or 36 months. The apparent appreciation for jamón Jabugo de Bellota, also called jamón ibérico, in Spain and now in the world “luxury goods market” has Italian prosciutto makers rethinking the potential for flavor development, and older and older hams will be on the market from each of the following as this new style develops. The best way to understand the differences is to go to a place that allows and promotes sampling and taste your options. Then go with what you love—simple and easy.
These three varieties are our favorites: PROSCIUTTO DI PARMA is from Emilia-Romagna’s Langhirano, between the Taro and the Baganza Rivers, near Parma. This ham is the king. The pigs are often fed the whey left from Parmigiano-Reggiano production, and we love the 18-month versions made by Galoni and Greci e Folzani. PROSCIUTTO DI SAN DANIELE is slightly sweeter than the Parma hams, in our opinion—because of the cooler ambient temperatures, a little less salt is used. These come from the San Daniele and Sauris regions of Friuli, and we love Fratelli Beretta and Principe. PROSCIUTTO LA QUERCIA, made by our friends Herb and Kathy Eckhouse in Iowa, is the best American prosciutto on the market. It is fragrant and more pork roasty than either of the Italian versions above. We love both their Green Label and their Rossa; their website is www.laquercia.us.
There are also hams called PROSCIUTTI CRUDI SALATI produced throughout regions farther south in Italy, including Toscana, Umbria, and Le Marche. These are more heavily salted and often have pepper and herbs such as rosemary or bay leaves and garlic.
Perhaps the most royal of all ham products is CULATELLO, made in the Bassa Parmense and Bassa Verdiana regions near Zibello in northern Emilia-Romagna. It was developed in these higher-humidity, lower-altitude regions as an alternative to prosciutto, and it comes from the largest muscle area at the top of the same rear thighs used to make prosciutto. Culatello is salted and often marinated in wine, then stuffed into a pig’s bladder and tied before being hung in these humid conditions. It is not legal for import into the U.S., but Salumi in Seattle makes the best one in the States, and we make a pretty mean one at Babbo as well. Otherwise, your best bet is to eat lots of culatello when you visit Italy, where slices are often served with the odd pat of butter and the strange cracker-like bread of northern Emilia.
We make all of the products below under the careful and fully HAACP-certified program developed by chef Dan Drohan at Otto and in part by chef Zach Allen, now at Carnevino in Las Vegas.
COPPA, often called “the poor man’s prosciutto,” is made from the muscles at the top of the shoulder near the base of the neck. The D.O.C. product from Italy is from Piacenza; it is traditionally cured with cookie spices such as cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg, along with salt and pepper, that are all massaged in, and then the whole fandango is packed into a beef bung and hung for 120 days. The one we make at Otto has cayenne and fennel seeds too.
BRESAOLA is air-dried beef eye of round, traditionally from the Valtellina in Lombardia. We rub ours with salt and pepper and a little sugar, bag it in beef bungs like the coppa, and hang it for 70 days. In Italy, bresaola is often served with sliced raw artichokes as an antipasto, or with robiola cheese.
LONZA is made from boneless pork loin, where pork chops come from. We cure ours with salt and fennel and hang it, unsheathed but tied like a roast, for 90 days.
PANCETTA is pork belly cured whole, like slab bacon, with sugar, bay, cinnamon, black pepper, and allspice. It is hung