Bündnerfleisch
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A block of air-dried meat, the signature product of the Grisons.
You can recognise Bündnerfleisch by its shape before its taste: a rectangular block, dark almost to black, sliced so thin that light shines through. On a plate the deep red slices fan out, with bread and nothing else.
That block was once a leg of beef. The tendons and fat are removed, the meat is rubbed with salt, pepper, garlic, juniper berries, bay and cloves, and the pieces are stacked in layers in a tub, in the cold, close to zero degrees. For several weeks they are turned and the layers swapped around so the salt reaches everywhere. Then comes drying, in nets, in cool air. From time to time each piece is pressed on both sides to spread the remaining moisture: this pressing is what gives it its brick shape. It is never smoked. By the end, the meat has lost nearly half its weight, and nothing more is needed to preserve it.
It began as a winter store in the valleys of Graubünden, and a festive dish. Its old name, Bindenfleisch, recalls the strips of cloth the meat was wrapped in; in the 20th century a man from Flims, Walter Gurtner, got “meat of the Grisons” adopted. The name has been protected since 2000, but the protection covers the canton’s know-how, not where the beef comes from.
Cut into thin strips or cubes, it also flavours soups and capuns.
Sources: Wikipedia, “Viande des Grisons” and “Bündnerfleisch” (German and English); SRF, “Bündnerfleisch aus Importfleisch”.
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