Question: Can Morton's Tender Quick be substituted for Prague Powder #1? I am not familiar with using either one, but I can get the Tender Quick at a local store ($4.00/2 lb. bag).
I would not use it.
Morton's Tender Quick is a mixture of sodium nitrate and sodium nitrite, whereas Cure #1's are straight Sodium Nitrate. What eh76 used was Prague Powder #1 which is nitrite only and used in most ham crafting. Two completely different things.
I called Morton today and asked their nitrate/nitrite levels and they stated that composition of Morton Tender Quick is sodium Nitrate is 5% and sodium nitrite is 5%. They also put some sugar (I heard it was 2%) and a touch of Propylene Glycol as a moisture desiccant.
The recipe calls for "2 tablespoons Prague powder #1 cure" nitrite in this type is "about" 6%??? So to get the same effects you would need to increase get the Morton up to the same level, which might be too salty. You would have to adjust the total salt content to match. The problem here is the amount of nitrite that's in it.
One issue you could run into is "Over Cure", because the nitrate will convert over to nitrite adding to the total nitrite count.
Some of the # 2 cures (Morton Tender Quick is one type) in the professional world is around the 5-6% areas, fairly close in composition of nitrate/nitrite to each other. Tender Quick is a bit watered down version of sodium nitrate/nitrite if this information is true. However, the recipe does stated that there is no need to cure, however I would use cure because of the immersion in liquid speeds spoilage, not to mention overall safety of the product against Staph Aureus and Clostridium.
I see this in a lot of different forums and searches for cure. People are under the perception that all of these curing salts are the same, and they are not. They have different amounts of active curing agents and different kinds for different meat products, not to mention different recipes for the same type of end compounds. What I mean by this is one companies #1 cure can have a different % than another companies #1 cure %.
There is actually a science behind their use. You simply can't just substitute one for the other and everything will turn out the same way.
Hope this clears up some miss conceptions out there.
