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Meat from Switzerland

Bündnerfleisch IGPBündnerfleisch

Trimmed cuts of beef leg are salted with curing salt and spices, stacked in their own brine for five days to five weeks, then air-dried for months and pressed several times into a rectangle. A white noble mould grows on the surface while it dries. It is a salt-and-drying cure, never smoked.

Fully documentedMeat34 days – 7.2 months

Recipe

Amounts from a sourceThe specification sets the cuts, the curing and drying steps and the end product, not the salt or spice amounts; each maker uses a house blend.
Beef leg muscles (topside, eye of round, silverside, knuckle)Trimmed of fat, sinew and fascia; raw meat pH 5.4–6.2[bf-spec]
Salt with curing agentSalt and spices alone are allowed if product safety is assured[bf-spec]
Spices such as pepper, garlic, ginger, juniper, bay leaf and allspiceEach maker's own blend[bf-spec]
Added carbohydrate (sugar)At most 0.5 g per 100 g of raw meat[bf-spec]
Startera noble mould forms on its own on the surface during ripening

Total time across the recorded steps: 34 days – 7.2 months

Start
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pH 5.4–6.2

What changes: Starting material: chilled beef leg muscles, trimmed clean

Step 1 of 5
Trim the chilled beef cuts
Time
Not documented
Temperature
Not documented
Salt
None given
Acidity
pH 5.4–6.2
Set
Which microbes the steps name, step by step
Moulds

Output: lean leg muscles with no fat, sinew or fascia.

Flavour
Not documented
Texture
Not documented
Colour
Not documented

Microbes at work in this step

Not documented for this step.

Method

Measured measured in a studySet fixed by a specification or tested recipeReported one source reports itTypical a general value, not sourced for this fermentUnconfirmed not yet checked against a source

At a glance

Trimmed cuts of beef leg are salted with curing salt and spices, stacked in their own brine for five days to five weeks, then air-dried for months and pressed several times into a rectangle. A white noble mould grows on the surface while it dries. It is a salt-and-drying cure, never smoked. Made in 5 steps over 34 days – 7.2 months. The longest step, air-dry and press several times, takes 28 days – 6 months (Bundesamt für Landwirtschaft BLW 1999) and runs at 1–18 °C (Verein Kulinarisches Erbe der Schweiz (Patrim…).

Key numbers
Main step28 days – 6 monthsSet[bf-spec][pc-ch]Air-dry and press several times
Temperature1–18 °CReported[pc-ch]Air-dry and press several times
AciditypH 5.4–6.2Set[bf-spec]Trim the chilled beef cuts

What makes this one different

Bündnerfleisch is preserved only by salt and drying and is never smoked. Repeated pressing gives its rectangular shape, and it must lose 45–55 % of its weight.

Related ferments

Variants

  • Walliser Trockenfleisch (viande séchée du Valais)A closely related salted, air-dried meat from the canton of Valais, named in the inventory entry.

Safety

The specification says salt and drying alone do the preserving, and requires a water activity of at most 0.92 in the finished product. The usual salting mix contains a curing agent, and salt and spices alone are allowed only if product safety is assured. This is raw-cured beef that is never cooked. CDC tells people who are pregnant, 65 or older or have a weakened immune system to avoid unheated deli meat and cold cuts, or to heat them until steaming hot.

History and sources

Every number is labelled with how it is known. How this atlas is made

German travel writers described it from the 18th century. The old name Bindenfleisch refers to the cloths (Binden) the meat was wrapped in. Tourism raised demand in the late 19th century, and slicing machines made thin slices common from the 1950s. Protected as an IGP in 1999.

  1. [cdc-listeria] US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Preventing Listeria Infectiongov
  2. [bf-spec] Bundesamt für Landwirtschaft BLW, Pflichtenheft Bündnerfleisch, geschützte geografische Angabe (GGA), Verfügung vom 24. September 1999, amended 2003, 2010 and 2017spec
  3. [pc-ch] Verein Kulinarisches Erbe der Schweiz (Patrimoine culinaire suisse), Bündnerfleisch (GGA/IGP) / Pulpa, inventory entry 342archive
  4. [hpt-bf] Arpagaus C. 2025, Air-dried beef, Bündnerfleisch, Switzerland, case study of IEA HPT TCP Project 59 (extract from Arpagaus C., Bless F., Brendel L.P.M., Gstöhl D., Bertsch S.S., Wärmepumpen für industrielle Trocknungsprozesse, BFE-Forschungsprogramm Tagung, 12 June 2025)web