Nduja
Meat
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'Nduja is a soft, spreadable salume from Calabria in southern Italy — fatty pork minced fine with a large quantity of dried Calabrian chilli, stuffed into a casing, smoked and aged. Brick-red and almost paste-like at room temperature, it is fiery, deeply porky and savoury, and is spread on warm bread, stirred into sauces or melted onto pizza rather than sliced.
Picking a good onedrag
Freshly cut: vivid red, soft, hot and smokyOff: slimy, mouldy or rancid
Sound and sealedBuy itSound to eat cold, as it comes. If you are pregnant, 65 or older, or immunocompromised, heat it until steaming hot or leave it: rarely, Listeria.
Colour of the pasteDarker where the air has met it, bright red beneath
Casing and sealA dusty white bloom outside the casing: the cure
Feel of the pasteFridge-firm; warmth softens it and pools red fat
Smell at the cutA lactic tang under the heat: the ferment, not rot