Traditional Italian Lonzo Recipe (Equilibrium Method)

Why Make Lonzo

Like many traditional Italian salumi, Lonzo is simple. It takes time and little planning, but the result can be epic, tasty, and unique. Lonzo is a dry cured craft meat spiced and offers leaner cured meat than other traditional Italian classics.

This type of salumi salt dry cured meat (full guide here) can be eaten often; it’s not overpowering or rich. It’s a classic antipasti/charcuterie board for every occasion.

Lonzo is often a leaner cut, although it can be trimmed to your preference. It consists mainly of meat with a moon-shaped streak of fat on the exterior.

I’ve found that Lonzo is quicker to dry to a target weight than many other traditional salumi (salumi vs. salami article) muscle cuts because it is less fatty.

I’ve only seen Lonzo/Lonzino on antipasti plates in Italy. I’ve not seen it used in cooking. As a preserved dry-cured whole muscle meat, once curing and drying is completed, Lonzo can last for many months, potentially years, if stored.

Lonzo is more often a Northern Italian variety (i.e. Emilia-Romagna, Marche). Lonzo is more associated with central (Tuscany, Umbria) and southern Italy. Lonzo is a different variation of salt-cured loin in Spain.

I started making Lonzo with wild meats other than pork many years ago. Since then, we have used whole pigs and regularly made Lomo, Lonza, and Lonzino.

Key Ingredients

To make this recipe as helpful as possible, I’ve created a custom calculator inside the craft recipe below. This will auto-calculate the salt and spices based on the weight of the meat.

Sea Salt is essential for any curing project. For this style of equilibrium curing, it’s best to make the salt finer (I prefer powdery) and distribute it throughout the meat during curing.

If you use pink-curing salt, 90% salt and nitrates/nitrites comprise the rest. Therefore, if you want a total salt amount of 2.25%, 0.25% of this total can be the pink-curing salt.

Quality of Meat

It all starts with quality pork. Certain breeds have been made famous for dry-cured (what is dry cured link) traditional meats like Duroc, White Berkshire, and Mangalica (also known as Mangalitsa or Mangalitza). The type of pig, how it is fed, and its age are important factors.

Many black pigs across Europe are famous for Salumi (and Spain) in Italy. Often, these pigs were partially free-roaming and getting a foraged diet of wild nuts, acorns, mushrooms, and truffles (check out Umbria, Italy, for more details).

This often means the pig must be 12-14 months old. I’ve usually found 16-24 months ideal for the meat-to-fat ratio (talk to the butcher or do the research!).

From the collar/coppa cut of the loin behind this, the other loin (back steak) is used to make Lonzo.

The process of dry curing meat intensifies the meat flavor, which is why meat quality is imperative to salt dry curing.

Sugar should not be an ingredient in classic Italian salumi of any kind.

Substitutes

Since this focuses on a traditional craft recipe with hundreds (possibly thousands) of years of history, it’s not appropriate to suggest substitutions.

The Lonzino is milder with garlic and pepper. Lonzo is often spicy with adding chili/pepperocino (but in a minimal amount, 0.1-0.3% in the below recipe).

Key Equipment

For this equilibrium salt dry curing method (link to a guide I wrote), an accurate digital scale – this is a subject covered a lot on this website, here is a page on scales. It’s nearly imperative (or another form of accurate scale allowing precise measurements of one decimal place per gram).

Having an adequate-sized bag for the jowl during curing is key. The air is to be removed inside the bag. I use Ziploc bags or water bath/sous vide bags for this task. The goal is to have the meat and cure “equalizing” inside the bag.

How to make Lonzo

If need be, you trim and process the meat first. Then, the curing stage begins, which can take 1 to 2 weeks.

An optional step is to have a fermentation stage before the drying to promote lactic acid production inside the meat naturally. Often at temperatures of 20°C/70°F for 20-30 hours to achieve this. The idea being to devleop the lactic acid flavor inside the cured meat.

The drying and hanging stage applies until sufficient moisture and weight loss have occurred.

Curing Steps

Step 1

Depending on the shape of the loin, you may need to shape and trim it. Traditional, it is round or oval in shape. Some casings can make the shape more round uniform with typing.

If you wish to have more fat on the it, you can.

Step 2

Weighing the meat first for the equilibrium curing method, you can also record the minimum 30% weight loss needed for the drying process below. The weight of the meat can be entered in the calculator below, which will auto-calculate the spices.

If using nitrates/nitrites, accurately calculate the required pink-curing salt No. 2 (optional). No.2 Pink Curing is for meat-curing projects over 30 days long.

Step 3

Use a mortar and pestle or spice grinder to make the salt cure mixture finer; if it is coarse, this will help spread the mixture evenly across the meat.

Ensure there are no lumps to spice clusters in the cure mixture.

Step 4

Mix salt cure mixture, and apply to meat in a bowl or lipped metal tray.

Step 5

Mix salt and cure mixture and apply to meat in a bowl or lipped metal tray. Place the meat and all the cure mixture from the bowl into a bag. Try to place all the cure mixture into the bag. You can fold the meat in the bag if you need to.

Step 6

Remove the air from the vac pac or ziplock bag; the goal is to have minimal air in the bag during curing.

Step 7

Cure in a fridge or cool area at 2-6°C or 35-45°F

Imperial – 3 Days per Inch Thickness of Meat

Metric – 3 Days per 25mm Thickness of Meat

The advantage of using equilibrium curing is that you can have the meat curing for an extra week or two. This will not increase the saltiness of the meat because it equalizes the salt content throughout the meat.

Drying Steps

Step 8

Once fully cured, remove the bag & rinse, optional, with water or wine.

(If you forgot, weigh the meat and calculate % of the weight; this is a minimum weight loss for the finished product after hanging/drying.)

Stage 9

To hang the meat, you can tie butcher’s twine like the picture below. then a S hook or butcher twine can hang onto a rod or rack. A chopstick can be used as per the picture also.

Hang the cured meat in a suitable environment. This could be a wine cellar, garage, shed, DIY dry curing chamber (article on DIY dry curing chamber here), commercial dry curing chamber, or other suitable environment

The conditions should be in this range approximately:

Temperature	Humidity
50-61°F/10-16°C	65-80%

You will need to check the meat regularly while it is drying. The reason for these conditions is to slowly dry the meat without drying the outside before the inside loses moisture (often called ‘case hardening’).

Airflow will also vary the speed of drying. A small amount of airflow is desirable, and ‘fresh’ air or a breeze is often preferred to avoid unwanted mold.

If too much ‘good’ mold forms, you can use vinegar to wipe or brush away the excess. For more on molds, please read this article.

Step 10

Once the weight loss is at least 30%, the dry cured meat is finished and can be eaten. Sliced wafer thin ideally!

Expert Tips

• To avoid drying the exterior at the beginning of hanging, a higher humidity of 85% can be used for a few days, then reduced to approximately 70-75%.
• Before tying, a casing over the meat can prevent the outside from drying out as much. Beef bung, pig bung, or collagen sheets can be used for this.

Recipe Variations

You can vary the amount of sea salt to your preference. A minimum of 2.0% salt is needed for curing. My salt level is often 2.25% total.

The maximum I prefer for saltiness in dry-cured whole muscle is 3.0%.

What & How to Serve

• Slice wafer-thin, add to antipasti board as a starter/appetizer

Frequently Asked Questions

Storing and Shelf Life

The environment is cool, approximately 50-60°F/10-15°C, the finished cured meat can be hung around the kitchen. It’s preserved, so you can thinly slice for serving when wanted.

Placing it unwrapped in the fridge will speed up the drying. Most domestic fridges have a humidity of 20-40%.

Vacuum-packing and storing it in the fridge can be used for several years. I’ve had dry-cured meats in vac-packed bags in my fridge for three years.

More Craft Recipes You’ll Enjoy

Italian pancetta tesa is another classic dry-cured salumi meat with a slightly different spice mixture.

What to Expect for Serving Size

Since dry cured meat often loses 30% of its weight, it’s a more condensed form of protein. Dry-cured salumi, like this, were never produced to be eaten as a primary protein for a meal.

It’s a craft creation to be savored in small amounts. Twenty to fifty grams is plenty per person as a starter.

Scaling the Craft Recipe

You will see below the recipe has an auto-calculating recipe based on the input of the meat weight.

This will allow you to calculate the salt cure mixture. If you wish to adjust the calculation below you can also use a meat curing calculator I created on this page.

Please feel free to comment or ask any questions!