"If you're an Italian in Italy," Herb says, "there's a lot that comes with the pork that you don't have here." In other words, without tradition to uphold, the Eckhouses are free to make prosciutto the way they want to.
"In Italy there's a saying, \o7'Quello che c'e,\f7' a pig eats what there is," he says. In Iowa, that would be corn and soybeans, not the absolute ideal feed for raising flavorful pork, but not bad either.
Every Friday, Herb and his small crew unload the fresh pork they get from a network of local farmers and pork producers such as Beeler, Eden Natural and Niman Ranch. When they were just starting out, the Eckhouses assumed that sourcing the pork would be the easy part, but the Eckhouses say the most challenging thing about starting the \o7prosciuttificio \f7has been finding pork that meets their exacting standards. "That just seemed so counterintuitive, given how many pigs there are here," Kathy says.
After unloading the meat, the crew gathers along a long table to salt about 500 hams, the pure sea salt crystals heaped in a geologic mound, some of it falling to scatter and crunch on the floor. "It's slightly sacramental, this process," Kathy says as she packs it around the curves and fissures of each ham.
Delicate, nuanced
THE Eckhouses use less salt than is traditionally used in Parma, and no garlic, and they shear more of the skin from the ham, using what is technically a \o7culaccia\f7 cut -- the choice femoral cut of the ham instead of the whole leg -- which results in a drier texture and a delicate, nuanced flavor. The smaller cut also lessens the curing time but still, according to Herb, ensures an intricacy of flavor.
After salting, the hams begin a cycle of curing, washing and trimming, then graduate to an aging process of eight to 12 months -- longer than the seven months required by the FDA, but shorter than the curing time for much traditional Italian prosciutto, some of which ages for 18 months or even longer.
During the curing time, the hams are painted with \o7sugna\f7, a mixture of lard, corn flour, salt and spices. (In Italy, wheat and/or rice is used, rather than corn flour.) The rooms of the plant were designed to replicate climate conditions prevalent in Italy during curing time, from late fall, when the pigs were traditionally slaughtered, through the cold winter and then the rising temperatures of spring and summer. At the end of the aging process, when the conditions outside are just right, vents are opened to let in the prairie winds.
