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Meat from Spain

Llonganissa de Vic / Salchichón de Vic PGILlonganissa de Vic

Llonganissa de Vic is a Catalan dry sausage of lean pork, fat, salt, sugar and black pepper, with no paprika. The mix is minced, macerated, stuffed into natural casings and cured for at least 30 or 45 days by size. A whitish mould from the plain's damp, foggy air covers it and turns purplish-brown with time.

A short entry: the sources we found record only what is said here about Llonganissa de Vic / Salchichón de Vic PGI itself.

Short entryMeat30 daysPGI (Reg. (EC) No 2601/2001; specification amended 2018)

Recipe

No fixed amounts recordedThe specification lists the allowed ingredients but not their amounts.
Lean porkHam, shoulder ham and top-quality lean[eu-vic-2017]
Pork fatVisible as dice in the cut[eu-vic-2017]
Salt[eu-vic-2017]
Black pepperThe only spice; peppercorns are visible in the cut[eu-vic-2017]
Sugar (mono- and disaccharides)[eu-vic-2017]
Nitrites, nitrates and ascorbate, or the producer's own sourdoughThe only other ingredients allowed[eu-vic-2017]
Natural casingWide, crimped, sewn or reconstituted[eu-vic-2017]
Starterspontaneous (house flora of the Plain of Vic); a producer's own sourdough is allowed

Total time across the recorded steps: 30 days

Start
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What changes: Lean pork and fat are trimmed and minced

Step 1 of 4
Trim and mince lean pork and fat
Time
Not documented
Temperature
Not documented
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented
Which microbes the steps name, step by step
Moulds
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

Llonganissa de Vic is a Catalan dry sausage of lean pork, fat, salt, sugar and black pepper, with no paprika. The mix is minced, macerated, stuffed into natural casings and cured for at least 30 or 45 days by size. A whitish mould from the plain's damp, foggy air covers it and turns purplish-brown with time. Made in 4 steps over 30 days. The longest step, cure and mature, takes at least 30 days (Single document 2016). Local microbial flora that the specification credits with the fermentation and the whitish surface mould does most of the fermenting.

Key numbers
Main stepat least 30 daysSet[eu-vic-2017]Cure and mature
AciditypH 5–6.7Set[eu-vic-2025]Cure and mature

What makes this one different

Llonganissa de Vic is seasoned only with salt, sugar and black pepper, with no paprika or garlic, so it is pale inside, unlike red chorizos. Its flavour is put down to the mould flora of the foggy Plain of Vic.

Related ferments

Safety

The specification sets a finished water activity below 0.92 and a pH of 5.0 to 6.7; the sausage is eaten without cooking. It is raw pork, and CDC says curing, drying or smoking alone does not consistently kill Trichinella worms. Oregon's rules for shops making dry sausage require certified trichina-free pork, a commercial starter, a pH test and a water-activity test on each batch, and a process shown to cut E. coli O157:H7 by 5 log. This page describes commercial production under a specification; it is not a tested home recipe.

History and sources

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

The specification cites written references to Salchichón de Vic from 1456 and praise in the newspaper El Porvenir in 1867. The plain has mist on 225 days a year on average.

  1. [eu-vic-2017] Single document: 'Salchichón de Vic'/'Llonganissa de Vic', EU No PGI-ES-2158 — 4.7.2016, Official Journal of the European Union C 368, 28.10.2017 (CELEX 52017XC1028(02))spec
  2. [eu-vic-2025] Single document: 'Salchichón de Vic'/'Llonganissa de Vic' PGI (amendment AM03), Official Journal of the European Union C/2025/349, 17.1.2025spec
  3. [s1] Barcelona és molt més, Vic llonganissa (tourism page, no longer online)web
  4. [cdc-trichinella] CDC, How to Prevent Trichinellosis (12 March 2024)gov
  5. [oha-sausage] Oregon Health Authority, Special Processes Guidance No. 2, Dry Fermented Sausage, HACCP checklist for operators (rev. 01/15)gov