Home preservation and dehydration thread

>>8264439
You can cook meat before dehydration, I just don't know why you'd want to. It's pointless extra work so it's rarely done. But there are some examples of it

>>nitrates
They're used in all kinds of meats, lean and otherwise. But what may be confusing you is if you're only reading about sausage recipes. Most sausage recipes require a minimum amount of fat otherwise the texture comes out awful.

>>how important
Depends on your opinion of risk and what taste you like, really. The nitrates contribute to the color, flavor, and safety of the finished product. OTOH there are some old-school cured recipes that don't use it.

If you're interested in this stuff then I highly recommend the book Charcuterie by Ruhlman.

>>8264450
My oven has busted temp control and I'd rather err on the side of caution when dehydrating. That being said does the book say anything about pork hearts? There's a bunch for a good price at my grocery store but won't to know if there is anything I should keep in mind other then it'll probably be kind of tough.

>>8264543
I can't recall anything in the book about pork hearts specifically but I haven't done every recipe.

I do make a lot of sausage though. You can use any cut of meat as long as the fat content ends up correct. If you choose a lean cut (like heart) then you'd simply add some extra fat to it. If you make sausage from a fatty cut like shoulder then you generally don't need to add any extra fat. I have made sausage with chicken hearts many times, tastes great.

As far as dehydrating goes, I'm less knowledgeable about that than I am with sausage, but I do know that the thickness of the meat and the humidity of your drying environment is critical. If the meat dries out too quickly then the outside will form a hard layer that prevents the moisture from the interior from escaping. That will spoil the meat for sure. And, of course, if it dries to slowly then it could spoil before the moisture content got low enough to render it safe. So I'd stick with tried-and-true recipes for that. The type of meat shouldn't matter, only the thickness/shape and the environment in which you dry/cure/dehydrate it.

>>8264601
I want to have a lightweight source of protein and didn't think of dry sausages before.

How fast can it reach the proper dryness and how important is the mold layer?

>>8264635
If your intention is backpacking you really need to worry about calories more than protein, if your body is deficit in fat it can't process any of it.