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Greetings folks ... Just getting into making dried sausage. Made first 2 batches 2 weeks ago. 1 Sopoerssata and 1 w/ wild Fennel. My hanging space is in my cheese Cave where I have 2 rooms running 52-54F w/ 1 at 80-85% moisture and the other at 70-74%.
I do have a lot of different cheese molds going on there but nothing really wild since they seem to have sorted themselves out over the past 10 years through competition. The molds range from blues to various whites surface molds such as geotrichum and p.candidum plus lots of washed rinds

?? Anyone see a problem with this arrangement??

Currently they have been hanging for about 2 weeks and have lost about 15-17% moisture. I have sprayed them w/ the 600 mold but no signs of white mold yet. They all seem to have a bit of an oily sheen to the surface of the natural casing but no white mold. No dark fuzzy molds or blue green either.

?? I am wondering if the oily fat on the surface will preclude the white growth and if that is a healthy thing?
?? Is the white mold really part of the ripening process or just a protective surface?

My understanding is that white mold does change the flavor, mainly if you eat it, but is not required, Its all based on personal preference and whether you need or want something to out compete bad molds. Its not needed for ripening like with Brie or Camembert. I wonder if PC would work as a protective mold just as well as Mold 600.

My cheese cave just got here last week and I'm going to be starting a brie this weekend. Hopefully it goes well.

Pictures are always better so here are a few

The Cheese Cave with Sopper and Fennel hanging


I am lucky enough to maintain a good natural ground temp but need to add a bit of moisture but only in the winter


Here they are drying at about 2+ weeks ... down by about 15-17% now and the casings seem to be shrinking and wrinkling as they dry. The oily surface seems to be less but no white mold even after spraying twice.

Is the white mold really part of the ripening process or just a protective surface?

I think of it more as a protective surface. It will change the rate at which moisture loss will occur. Some find that the taste is affected and it is also traditional for some sausages. I would worry most about a blue cheese mold taking hold on your sausage in your cheese cave but I have no experience with this. Please continue to update your progress so we can advise others as to whether this is a good idea or not.

Below is some interesting info from a study done in Brazil
Penicillium nalgiovense …600 Bactoferm (TM) Sausage Mould( Formerly M-EK-4 )

http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script= ... 0000100009
Apr. 2000 .. Effect of starter strain of Penicillium nalgiovense as salami

Tested w/ & w/out P.Nalg 600 BactoFerm
The moisture loss occurred slowly and progressively, no significant difference between inoculated and non-inoculated (P> 0.05) at the end of the maturation period.
There was also no significant difference in the levels of pH, NPN, sensory attributes and acceptability.
… it is considered that there is an enrichment qualitative and quantitative elements of Salamis in aromatics and flavor, as a result of lipid and protein metabolism of fungal microbiota in the surface of salami in maturation processes [4]. Furthermore, fungal growth desirable prevents the adverse effects of oxygen (rancidity and discoloration) and allows a more uniform drying [5, 24]. Additionally, implies the degradation of lactic acid [>pH], an important factor of the "flavor" [reduces the sour acid taste]

Other species that may be cited as the "starter" potential are P. candidum and P. gladioli

attributes of taste, aroma and color responses showed 57% of the evaluators recognized differences between the inoculated and uninoculated salami, whereas the remaining 43% responses were similar for the two types of product. concluded that the variables which contribute to the organoleptic aspects peculiar feature of salami not satisfactory levels to detect differences between products with or without inoculum.

it is concluded that the use of "starter" fungal justified by the protection factor it offers.
small improvement in the contents of NPN and AGL without, however, reaching levels that allow for differentiation of sensory aspects of flavor, aroma and color between pieces of control and inoculated with the mold "starter"
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PS .. I have been researching and teaching workshops on traditional cheesemaking for about a dozen or more years now. In the process I have been bringing back quite the collection of mold samples on my cheeses from Italy and France, many of which I am sure have found homes in my cave. Over the years I am sure these have caused a shift in the dominant flora of the cave. This should make this new adventure with cured sausage quite interesting to see what develops on them.

Is that fan always on? I worry that it might create too much airflow and cause case hardening.

It's always on but extremely low volume ... just enough to keep the air in there from stratifying.
At 2 weeks plus and 17% avg moisture loss I am running about 1% loss per day.
??? How does that hold up to the experience out there?

I have 2 rooms in my cave one for drying the cheese and one for aging at a higher moisture. The cheese are now in the drying room (larger and no fan).
The drying room runs about 70-75% and 53-55F .. its also where I keep my wines as well .. good temp and moisture for the corks too.
The aging room is usually 80-85% and 53-55F but started out at 72-75% when I first hung in there. The temp was just too cold and thus less moisture from the ground

NCPaul wrote:... I would worry most about a blue cheese mold taking hold on your sausage in your cheese cave but I have no experience with this...

Would that necessarily be a bad thing if were "good" blue mould? It might not look very nice but surely it wouldn't do any harm. Or am I missing something here? Can the same mould will make you ill if it grows on meat but not if it grows on cheese?

I wonder if this white is good, everything else is bad is a bit over the top sometimes. I bought a stick of Spanish Iberico chorizo from Waitrose a few weeks ago that had a veritable rainbow of colours of on it. White, orange, yellow, green, blue. It didn't seem to do me any harm.

I'm pretty sure I get some B. linens on my own salami. I don't see the colour that you get on cheese but they often smell a bit like sweaty feet.

1% per day is in line with what i see in the beginning, it slows down when they get drier because there is less moisture to lose relative to their original weight. I checked my graphs yesterday and it takes my 61mm thick salamis a bit over 2 months to get into the low 40s in weight loss. Every time i have cut them open at 35% they have still been too soft for my liking.

The blue would be a problem I expect because it works quite unlike the white P.nalg or P.candidum which are surface molds. The blue tends to work inside the cheese and probably would work its way under the surface. Also the blue tends to be lypolytic (breaking down fats) whereas the white molds tend to be proteolytic.
The other thing the white does is to produce some alkaline product which would tend to counteract the acid flavor of the fermentation process.

Not sure how it would shake out in reality but we my just find out here.