Enter meat weight, fat ratio, cure method, and humidity. The card gives salt, sugar, wine, lean/fat split, and days.
Why this exists
Chinese sausage recipes vary 2x in salt percentage. Without nitrite cure, air-drying at home is unsafe. Most online tutorials ignore this and produce sausages that smell fine but harbor botulism risk.
Who this is for
Anyone attempting Chinese sausage for the first time. Cooks confused by the safety warnings vs the no-nitrite recipes online. People preserving meat from a hunt.
How to read the result
Cure #2 (sodium nitrite, dyed pink) is what gives cured meat its characteristic color AND its safety. Pink Himalayan salt contains trace nitrite but not enough. Buy cure #2 from a butcher-supply shop. The "Quick cure + refrigeration" option does not require nitrite because the sausage is refrigerated and eaten within a week.
Honest limitations
Indoor humidity is hard to control. A small dehumidifier helps. 80% humidity is risky - if you see fuzzy mold growing, discard. A small amount of white surface mold is harmless; wipe with vinegar.
Common questions
Frequently asked questions
What are the common mistakes when using Chinese Sausage Curing Salt?
Most common mistakes come down to four habits: entering 20 when the field expects 0.2 because the field is a percentage; leaving a field blank and accepting the default without checking what it stands for; changing one input and reading a result that was calculated before the change; and quoting the output as an exact figure when the page describes it as a reference estimate. Press calculate again after any edit, and treat the number as a reference point rather than a final answer.
How do I read the result from Chinese Sausage Curing Salt?
Read the final figure first, then come back to this section for the conditions behind it: Cure #2 (sodium nitrite, dyed pink) is what gives cured meat its characteristic color AND its safety. Pink Himalayan salt contains trace nitrite but not enough. Buy cure #2 from a butcher-supply shop. The "Quick cure + refrigeration" option does not require ni Keep two things apart: the number itself, which comes from the values you typed, and the assumptions it depends on, which decide whether that number is meaningful. The page sets out what a higher or lower result means for your case, so check that direction as well as the magnitude.
Can I act on the Chinese Sausage Curing Salt result directly?
Treat it as one reference sheet before you decide, rather than as the answer itself: Indoor humidity is hard to control. A small dehumidifier helps. 80% humidity is risky - if you see fuzzy mold growing, discard. A small amount of white surface mold is harmless; wipe with vinegar. The output describes a magnitude under the conditions you entered. It does not include what it actually costs to act, what might change while you act, or how the other side behaves. Before you commit, compare the result against reality and note which assumptions do not hold where you are.
What inputs does Chinese Sausage Curing Salt need?
Chinese Sausage Curing Salt takes 1 inputs: Meat weight (g). They are listed in the order they feed the calculation, so an earlier value can change a later one. Do not skip a field you do not recognise - work out what it means first, because a silently guessed value produces a number that looks reasonable and is not. Before typing anything, make sure every figure uses the same unit and the same time period.
What should I check before I run Chinese Sausage Curing Salt?
Three checks pay for themselves. First, confirm the question you need answered is really inside the scope of this tool rather than a neighbouring one. Second, confirm that the figures you have are drawn from the same source and the same period - mixing monthly and annual numbers, or two different definitions of the same quantity, quietly distorts the result. Third, keep the key inputs written down, so that later you can tell which set of numbers produced a figure you are about to quote.
Can I skip nitrite? No for air-dried sausage. Yes only for sausage you cook immediately and refrigerate.
Where to buy casings? Butcher or online sausage supply. Hog casings for traditional; collagen for easier handling.
Why pink even after cooking? That's the nitrite doing its job - it's the color, not undercooking.