Salume is an Italian term for a food made from raw or cooked meat,
with the addition almost always of salt, sometimes animal fat, herbs and spices,
and possibly other ingredients and preservatives. In other languages, the term is used
to identify typical Italian cured meats, sausages and hams.
Types and varieties
When sealed in a casing, it is called a sausage (traditionally the intestines of the animal
are used, though today synthetic materials are also used). It is preserved in different ways,
depending on whether it is raw, cooked, cured or smoked. Sausages can be made from the meat
of other farmed animals (beef, goose, goat, donkey, sheep) and wild game (wild boar, deer,
roe deer), but pork is certainly the most commonly used for this purpose — both in whole
pieces (thighs, shoulders, cuts) and minced into sausages, whether raw (salami and sausage)
or cooked (mortadella, zampone, cotechino). Mention should also be made of fish-based cured
products found locally in Italy, such as Sicilian ficazza di tonno, Ligurian musciame, and
trout salami from Trentino and Piedmont.
Raw ham is obtained from the leg of the pig, cured either by dry-salting, by immersion
in brine, or by injection of the saline solution into the femoral artery. Dry salting is
the traditional process and the most suitable for achieving a high standard of quality.
The piece is rubbed with salt once a day for the duration of a month, in a refrigerated
environment; at the end of this process, the ham is washed with lukewarm water and left to
mature in the open air for at least three months (for the finest products, even a year).
Salami is made from different cuts of meat, which are minced and mixed with fragments of
fat, salt and pepper; the mixture is then stuffed into casings, which are tied off with
string at regular intervals. This is followed by a maturing period (1 to 6 months) in a
ventilated, cool environment (10 to 13°C).
(source: Wikipedia)
(Selection 2026)