Since founding Vermont Salumi in 2011, Peter Colman has wanted to make a cured salami. But until recently, the Italian-born, Vermont-raised meat man has stuck to fresh sausages — salty, savory pork tinged with pepper or wine and packed into natural hog casings. They're fantastic, but cured they are not.
Though Colman had worked under Italian butchers and salumieri, he encountered challenges navigating the complex web of rules governing cured-meat production. Creating a viable HACCP (hazard analysis and critical control points) plan for a dry-curing operation took longer than he'd hoped.
In early 2013, Colman's HACCP plan (the first to win approval for cured salami in Vermont, he believes) was approved, and he set to work on his first independent cures. Though Colman was working with extremely fresh, locally raised pork that he butchered himself, it took him more than a year to produce something he felt comfortable selling. "I wasn't that happy with the way they were coming out six months ago," Colman says.
To read the rest of the story, please go to: Seven Days