Salami

Salami (Салямі, also salame) is a dry-cured sausage of chopped pork, hard fat, salt and spices that is never cooked: it gets its flavour and firm texture from fermentation and drying. FAO names salami as a typical raw fermented sausage, and Spanish law places it in the salchichón group. For the wider group see Dry-cured sausages.

Italy's Salamini italiani alla cacciatora (PDO) are made from lean pork, hard fat, salt, pepper and garlic. The pigs are the Italian heavy type, at least 160 kg and 9 months old (per the original 2001 specification, amended since). Salame Felino (PGI) rules out boars, sows and frozen meat. Hungarian Szegedi szalámi (PDO) is pork with back fat, white pepper, allspice and paprika; the only additive is nitrite curing salt.

Each kind keeps its own pace. For cacciatora the meat is ground through a 3–8 mm plate, filled into a casing up to 75 mm, dried at 18–25 °C without forced fermentation and ripened at least 10 days at 10–15 °C. Felino is dried 4–6 days at 13–24 °C and then ripens at least 25 days at 12–18 °C, in a natural pork casing tied by hand with a single string. Szegedi is cold-smoked for 12–14 days and ripens about 90 days with no starter cultures. Salame Piacentino (PDO), per the text of its amendment request, ripens at least 45 days.

Where do they come from? Official specifications give no dates of origin, so none are given here. Felino is made in the province of Parma, Piacentino in the province of Piacenza below 900 m, Szegedi in Szeged.

A cacciatora cut is uniform ruby red with evenly spread flecks of fat; the taste is sweet and delicate, «never sour», and protein is at least 20 %. Felino has at least 23 % protein and a grey-white surface, slightly powdery from mould. Szegedi is smoky and spiced, with the roundness of noble mould.

Unlike a cooked sausage such as a frankfurter, or boiled sandwich ham, salami is never cooked: fermentation and drying give it flavour and firmness. Compared with hams (Dry-cured hams and shoulders, Jamón, Prosciutto crudo), salami has chopped meat rather than a whole cut. Size helps tell them apart: cacciatora is a small stick of about 350 g and 60 mm, Felino runs from 200 g to 4.5 kg, Piacentino weighs 400 g–1 kg, and Szegedi is smoked as well.

At a deli counter or in the supermarket chiller, cacciatora shows its name in clear letters followed by «Denominazione di origine protetta», the Italian wording of the EU PDO (protected designation of origin) mark. It is sold whole, in pieces, vacuum-packed or sliced, but slicing and packing must happen in the production zone. You can spot Felino by its single string and Szegedi by its grey-white noble mould.

Why does this matter to you? Per 100 g of Italian salami, USDA lists 21.7 g protein, 37.0 g fat and 1890 mg sodium, so portions stay small. IARC (WHO) classes processed meat in Group 1: each 50 g eaten daily raises colorectal cancer risk by about 18 %. So on the label read the name, the protected status and the ingredients: salt and nitrite.