What’s The Difference Between Pancetta and Prosciutto? Here’s What to Know About These Italian Meats
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Pancetta and prosciutto are often confused, since both are traditional Italian cured pork products that taste deeply savory and salty. That said, they come from different parts of the pig, the processes to make them are different, and we use them in different ways. Here’s how to keep them straight.
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Pancetta
What it is: Pancetta is seasoned salt-cured pork belly (just like bacon but not smoked) that’s rolled and often put in a casing before being hung to dry to develop firm texture and deep flavor. It must be cooked before eating.
Forms: It can be sliced to order behind the deli counter or bought presliced in packages. (It also comes prediced, which we don’t recommend—we’ve found that the cubes often taste sour.)
How we use it: We like to cut it into small chunks and sauté it to add savory depth as well as intensely flavorful, meaty bites to dishes from soups and stews to pastas.
Prosciutto
What it is: Prosciutto is the salt-cured hind leg of the pig (i.e., ham) that’s air-dried for months or even years, giving it a markedly dense, silky texture and a delicate, nutty flavor. Prosciutto is safe to eat without cooking.
Forms: It can be sliced to order at the deli counter or bought presliced in packages.
How we use it: We like raw slices as part of an antipasto platter or wrapped around fruit or vegetables. We also use it in cooked applications, such as saltimbocca, and we crisp it for a salad topping.
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You DO NOT have to cook Pancetta. It's cured with salt and nitrites, which is NO DIFFERENT than Prosciutto. Thinly sliced? It's absolutely delicious with many 'Hors D’oeuvre' recipes UNCOOKED, and you're actually lessening the flavor by cooking it.
I've been making and eating it this way for over thirty years and have never once got sick, got worms, etc.
I'm sure you're still thinking pork is filled with Trichinosis, which isn't the case since feeding garbage to pork was banned forty years ago. (That being said, I would never eat 'under cooked' bear because bear's test positive for Trichinosis almost 100%)
Pancetta is Salt cured ,dried and smoked . You eat it as a cold cut – or cooked in different recipes. Americans….ROFL
When you wanna make carbonara but couldn’t find guanciale
This just served the Pancetta Raw, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UiTfPh9PHdc
I don’t know what panchacha or panchoochoo is. I am from far away country. And also I spell it this way cuz I am jus lazy to look bk at the correct spelling 😳
I came here to find out about what is in pancetta, not for you to talk to me like i am retarded.
Everyone knows there is a difference. Anyone who even has never seen any before would on visual inspection be able to tell that they are very different hams.
Stop being so condecending
Bro why do I love Dan so much
I've just lost some time-honoured respect for "Cooks Illustrated". Guess you don't really have to cook pancetta? Do delli markets sell raw meats that you have to cook before incorporating in sandwitches?
"used for different things"
uhm not here….we just eat it lol
and eat little portions at a time…we only want the flavor of the meat especially when we have to get a second mortgage on the house just buy a pound of it!
Don't go to crappy stores like walmart to buy anything like it…if you want genuine flavor and quality, you have to find specialty stores and in some Giant Eagle stores near large cities sell the more-authentic brands of it
Love this video, thank you!
it is untrue that you have to cook pancetta to eat it.
You do not have to cook pancetta, many on youtube making it disagree.
You don’t have to cook pancetta if you let it dry out enough. It’s the same as eating prosciutto. They’re both cured dried raw meat.
In Argentina we never cook Pancetta… we literally just put it in sandwiches likes it’s a deli meat. We prefer our pancetta uncooked, thank you very much.
I watched this eating raw pancetta giving no f**ks
Do you really Cook pancetta? OMG
+1. Pancetta is very nice (and naughty) when it's thinly sliced and eaten just like that on its own, or on a crunchy crostini or in between two slices of freshly baked bread, unless you have the king of all bread rolls, know by the name of "rosetta".
Without being rude, I’d like to ask what’s wrong with his mouth ?
No different they both rot in your stomach and cause cancer
"if YOu donT KNOW" how to master your sound…
Prosciutto di San Daniele is one of life's greatest pleasures. It's like sex for your tastebuds.
Why aren't you showing the 2 products you are talking about?
Not only do I not know the difference, I've never heard of either one.
Damn, you just made me smarter and hungry at the same time.
He makes my knees weak…!
Thanks for the overview!
Crispy fried prosciutto is pretty awesome, though.
This is useful… but would be way more useful if you actually showed either thing you are talking about.
Giada explains it better =))
There's gonna be more comments about his lip than anything isn't there? Yes I know that includes this one
My dude. Did you have a stroke. Im worried your lip is drooping.
DID YOU MEAN
pancetta vs. porchetta
Actually it is NOT true that you must cook pancetta. We here in Italy eat it even raw, sliced in bread or rolled around vegetables as appetizer. Just like other "salumi", like Lardo and Coppa
One is ham, one is belly, one is sated, one is peppered, one can eat raw, one can eat cooked
I cant stop looking at his mouth.