Spam! I remember eating my fair share while in college and the very though of eating a spam casserole, spam quesadillas, or a spam burger takes me on a trip down memory lane.
Today we are making spam at home and it’s going to be awesome . In this recipe we will be emulsifying our meat and fat to make our “spam” resemble the store bought stuff. The process of emulsifying meat and fat together can be a bit tricky and if you don’t have a food processor with razor sharp blades then you might want to skip this step. Dull blades will cause too much air to get incorporated into your meat mixture leaving you with a very soft texture.
If you do skip the emulsifying step that’s ok. Mixing it in a stand mixer with the paddle attachment works as well. The texture will be different but your “spam” will still come out delicious!
The trick to this charcuterie is temperature. You will want everything to either be partially frozen or ice cold. We are trying to maintain the integrity of the fat (especially through the grinding process). If the temperature of the fat rises to much it will begin to smear and we do not want that. Keep everything cold. A good habit to get into when grinding your own meat is to place your auger, blades, and tray in the freezer for 30-45 minutes before using. This practice in addition to keeping the meat very cold (30f-34f) really improves your final product.
Once you’ve either mixed or emulsified your meat you’ll need to decide on how to cook it. I personally like to stuff my spam into a fibrous casing, vac seal it, and cook it sous vide. This low and slow cooking process sets the mix and produces a juicier product. If you don’t have an immersion circulator you can always cook it in your oven at 350F till the internal temp reaches 155F. Enjoy the video.
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Homemade Spam
Ingredients
- 1816 g lean pork
- 454 g pork back fat
- 6 g Insta cure #1
- 34 g Kosher salt
- 6 g black pepper
- 22 g turbinado sugar or white sugar
- 3 g onion powder
- 6 g garlic powder
- 3 g chipotle powder
- 1/2 cup potato starch or corn starch
- 1 cup ice cold water (with ice chips in it)
Instructions
- Process the pork and the fat by cutting into small strips. Place it in the freezer till the temperature gets to 30-34F
- Grind the partially frozen pork and fat together on a 10mm plate and re chill
- Grind the chilled meat on a 4.5mm plate
- Place the meat and the seasonings in a food processor along with the ice chips
- As the mince meat and ice chips are being chopped up in your food processor, slowly add the ice cold water. Be sure to keep the farce below 59F
- Once properly emulsified, stuff the farce into a casing and tie it off. Place the newly cased sausage in a vac sealed bag and let it rest in the refrigerator overnight.
- The next day, cook in a water bath at 140F for 2-3 hours.
- Once cooked place the sausage in an ice bath to cool it down.
- Slice and enjoy. This spam is really great pan seared.
Alternate Instructions
- If you don't want to emulsify the spam you can double grind the chilled meat, then place the ground meat in a kitchen aid mixer. Add the seasonings and the ice cold water (with ice chips) and mix with the paddle attachment on medium speed for a minute or two. Your mix should be sticky. You can either case it up and poach the meat or place it into a mold and bake it at 350F till the internal temp reaches 155f
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The charcuterie kitchen is complete but I am still waiting on Dry Age curing cabinets. I have been using the Umai bags, for lomo, lonzino and Capocolla. I just need to christen the kitchen, so I made this recipe. I love this flavor profile.
LOL. Great way to get started. What are you expecting the cabinets?
Would this taste like spam without the insta cure and since I don’t have casing that large, would it turn out by making a log and wrapping it up in tin foil, putting that in a vacuum bag and doing the water bath?
Getting that spam flavor is tough. The cure only gives you a “hammy” flavor. If you do the method you described above it should work fine. Just don’t vac seal it. The mince meat will pour out all over the place..
Just curious, why do you sous vide this at a temperature of 140° when the alternate directions are for baking to an internal temp of 155°? Are you relying on the longer cooking time to pasteurize the meat and, if so, is the lower temp giving you a better temperature than cooking in a 155° water bath?
Sorry, I meant “better texture,” not “better temperature.”
Yes. The lower temp keeps the product very juicy, pasteurizes the meat, and IMO delivers a better texture. Either way works
Just curious why your sous vide instructions call for a 140° water bath when your alternative instructions call for a 155° internal temperature. Are you relying on the longer sous vide cooking time for pasteurization and, if so, is the lower temperature preferable for texture?
That is correct. For this sausage it doesn’t matter a whole lot because it gets fried later, but I prefer the slow gentle cook that sous vide offers in this case
Hi Eric
My question is the ham portion of the spam recipe is the ham cured or fresh ham?And if it is fresh ham can you substitute with lean pork shoulder?
it’s fresh ham. Sure, pork shoulder would work