The Food Lab: Better Home Cooking Through Science

(Nandana) #1

must use a scale when making sausage!) and allowed to rest
for 8 hours in the refrigerator. The latter was left completely
unseasoned. I ground both of them in a meat grinder and
formed them into balls. Even before cooking, there was a
drastic difference in texture. While the salted meat stuck
firmly to itself in a tight ball, the unsalted meat was messy—
mushy even.
I then poached them in 180°F water until they reached an
internal temperature of 160°F, before cutting them in half.
Check out what happened.
You can plainly see that while the salted sausage on the left
held together, with a smooth, resilient texture, the unsalted
sausage on the right completely crumbled, in much the same
way that an overcooked burger will do.

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