To
cure or
preserve by treating with
salt or a salt
solution.
Salting is one of the
oldest,
simplest, and most
effective methods of
food preservation. Centuries ago, salting was the most popular method of preserving meats (smoking and drying meats was also popular). Today however, companies rely mainly on
freezing as a means of preservation.
To understand why salting
works you must first understand why meats will spoil. There are two
reasons:
autolysis and
bacteria. Autolysis is the deterioration of the meat caused by
enzymes already present in the
tissue. Bacteria will also deteriorate the meat. This occurs because in such favorable conditions (
dead tissue) the bacteria is allowed to multiply and grow very quickly. This results in the production of many enzymes that break down and
destroy the meat tissue.
When
salt is introduced, the large majority of the bacteria destroyed. However, in order for the salting to be effective, the tissue of the meat must absorb the salt and replace its water content with a salt and water solution before bacteria and autolytic decomposition are allowed to
spoil the meat. Some factors affecting this are
temperature, salt
purity, and
variety of meat.
Also, there are two methods of salting.
Dry salting and
brine salting. The selection of which method should be used depends mostly on the
type of meat (mainly it's
fat content).