All Charcuterie

With cured meat, the format moves the price more than anything else on the label. The cheapest ounce below is a whole 1 lb acorn-fed salchichón at $2.68. The dearest is hand-cut acorn-fed shoulder ham in 2.5 oz packs at $21.33 — almost eight times as much, and both are acorn-fed. What the packs buy you is that somebody else did the cutting, portioning and sealing.

*The coppa is sold by the piece rather than by a fixed weight. A whole cured muscle does not leave the cellar at an exact weight, so the per-ounce figure is based on the approximate 2.5 lb its label states, and the piece you receive may be above or below it.

What goes on a board?

Three textures do the work: something sliced thin (ham), something firm to cut into coins (chorizo or salchichón), something to spread (sobrasada). The Ibéricos KIT at $82.66 covers the first two — its listing is five 2 oz packs of ham, loin, chorizo and salchichón — so the sobrasada is the third thing to add. A Little Bit Of Spain, now $129, takes the same idea wider: Serrano, Palacios chorizo, cheeses that vary with the case, anchovy-stuffed olives, Marcona almonds and quince paste. Cheese belongs on the same board — a 1 lb Mahón is $19.99, which is $1.25 an ounce, and a whole 6.6 lb Manchego DOP wheel at $199 is $1.88 an ounce. The cheese side of the board is priced by the ounce on the cheese page.

Whole piece or sliced packs?

Packs are vacuum-sealed and need nothing but a plate. A whole piece needs a knife and a board, and costs less by the ounce — but how much less depends on which sausage, and the grade does not always travel with the format. The whole acorn-fed chorizo is $3.12 an ounce; the sliced chorizo packs are $8.38, and their label does not declare the acorn-fed grade. Salchichón is $2.68 an ounce whole against $4.37 sliced, a much narrower gap. It is the same question we worked out for the legs in full on is a whole jamón cheaper than sliced?, and the mechanism is the same one: a sliced pack charges you for cutting, portioning and sealing, not for more meat.

What the grades on these labels mean

Spanish law puts a coloured seal on an Ibérico leg: black and red for bellota, green for cebo de campo, white for cebo. A sausage has no hoof for a seal to sit on, so the claim lives on the packaging label instead — look for the grade spelled out in full, and treat its absence as an absence. What separates the grades, and Serrano from all of them, and how to read a seal and a label.

Buying for a counter or a kitchen? Cost per plate, piece by piece. Sending it to someone? Spanish food gifts sorts the options by budget. The long version of all of it is in the Ibérico buying guide.

Prices verified 5 November 2026.