Patent ID: 7998517

Claim:
A process for dry aging meat for a selected number of days, comprising: providing an enclosed, temperature and humidity controlled aging room having a pair of spaced apart longer length walls each with a height, a pair of spaced apart shorter width walls each with the same height, a floor and a ceiling, for enclosing a volume for containing an aging atmosphere; controlling the temperature and the humidity of the aging atmosphere in the aging room to be within selected temperature and humidity ranges; providing along substantially all of the length and height of one of the length walls, a stainless steel salt rack carrying an ordered stack of a multiplicity of salt bricks, each salt brick in the stack having a smaller width compared to a length and a height of the brick for increased surface area of the stack in the aging atmosphere, the salt rack being space from the one length wall for allowing circulation of the atmosphere around the stack of bricks; providing a plurality of meat racks in the aging room, spaces between the stack of bricks and the other one of the length walls, the meat racks being arranged around the aging room in a respective plurality of aging locations from remote locations spaced furthest from the salt rack, to intermediate locations that are closer to the salt rack, to proximal locations that are along the salt rack; forcibly circulating the atmosphere in the aging room around the meat racks and the salt racks; loading a first plurality of unwrapped and uncovered meat pieces to be dry aged, onto a meat rack at one of the remote locations; leaving the first plurality of meat pieces at the one remote location for a first time cycle corresponding to a fraction of the total selected number of days for the dry aging; after the passage of the first time cycle, moving the first plurality of meat pieces to one of the intermediate locations; leaving the first plurality of meat pieces at the one intermediate location for a second time cycle corresponding to a fraction of the total selected number of days for the dry aging; after the passage of the second time cycle, moving the first plurality of meat pieces to one of the proximal locations that are along the salt rack; leaving the first plurality of meat pieces at the one proximal location for a third time cycle corresponding to a fraction of the total selected number of days for the dry aging; and after the passage of the third time cycle, removing the first plurality of meat pieces from the aging room; the total of all of the time cycles equaling the selected number of days of dry aging for the first plurality of meat pieces.