How are deli meats made?

Question

How are deli meats made? I know some, such as pastrami are cured... but how are the others done? For example, when you get deli turkey or chicken, it clearly doesn't have the taste or texture of how it would taste out of the oven - and same goes for roast beef as deli meat. How is it done exactly?

Answer 1

I watched one night on the food network how ham is made. Highly processed. Almost like melted down into a mushy mess and then packed tightly to give it the shape. I will try to find a link to the video and repost. You can try checking it out on the food network.

Here I found some links- these are helpful and better explain what I was trying to say

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16361276/

http://www.foodtv.ca/content/recipes/Con...

Answer 2

Most of the turkey and beef and chicken is parboiled in covered pans with water and spices to make them extra tender and moist before they are sliced.

Deli meats generally are the cheaper parts of the animals and most are preserved in some fashioned so they didn't have to be refrigerated at least until sliced.

The ham, pastrami, prosciuttos are cured and hung.

A lot of the salamis and bolognas are cured and cased and hung.  And nowadays some are just refrigerated so they can be more bland like modern bologna.

Delis of today with advanced refrigeration have much more variety then  the Delis of old New York.

Answer 3

The likes of Turkey and chicken are cooked industrial ovens and are allowed to well and truly rest before they begin to carve, often hours.

At home we are not prepared to wait, besides I think they have additives.