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Q-talk *ON TOPIC ONLY* QUALITY ON TOPIC discussion of Backyard BBQ, grilling, equipment and outdoor cookin' . ** Other cooking techniques are welcomed for when your cookin' in the kitchen. Post your hints, tips, tricks & techniques, success, failures, but stay on topic and watch for that hijacking.


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Old 12-06-2017, 03:05 PM   #16
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Wow, I seriously learned alot in 10 posts on this thread.
You and me, both.

Just butchered a hog and making bacon with the belly and jowls is on my to-do list. Is there a seminal thread on making bacon? Something akin to the UDS thread? If so, could someone point me to it?
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Old 12-06-2017, 03:51 PM   #17
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Old 12-06-2017, 04:07 PM   #18
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.... Is there a seminal thread on making bacon? Something akin to the UDS thread? If so, could someone point me to it?
This is my post from previous threads, just copied and pasted here. Ignore the part about it being for buckboard bacon (and how to cut the shoulder for buckboard, etc), and the rest is completely the same for belly bacon.

HERE'S A WRITE-UP I DID FOR ANOTHER FELLA, JUST COPIED/PASTED HERE:

For your first bacon, I'd recommend starting with buckboard bacon (just pork butt). It's a cheap way to break the ice and build confidence! The taste is identical, and you end up with a 3:1 meat to fat ratio instead of the inverse with belly. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE fatty belly bacon, but I find a lot of pleasure in the thrift of curing and sausage making, and buckboard yields much better at roughly 1/3 of the cost! Occasionally, you'll read a comment that buckboard tastes more hammy than bacony, but those folks 1) didn't smoke long enough, and usually tried smoking it as one big hunk; or 2) Warm smoked instead of cold smoking it which provides a much more robust smokey bacon flavor. Cold smoking is THE way to go for bacon in my not so humble opinion! Your smoking method and the following meat cutting step will take care of that.

Instead of curing a whole thick gnarly butt, I butterfly them open and cut in half while removing the bone. Here's how:
http://www.smokingmeatforums.com/a/b...uckboard-bacon (except go ahead and separate the two halves completely). This way you end up with 2 slabs that are roughly the thickness of regular belly bacon for more even curing and better smoke penetration. An average 10# butt will yield 2 pieces at appx 4.4# after bone loss and slight "squaring" cuts. Make sure to remove the gray stinky gland meat from the edge of the butt, most meat packers don't. Stinky butt gland, HA!!!

I HIGHLY recommend an equilibrium dry cure. It leaves nothing to chance (i.e. ALL too common oversalting woes) the way a wet cure does, plus saves a lot of frig space. It's impossible to oversalt or under cure this way, plus in my opinion it just tastes better than a wet cured bacon. You'll need a digital meat scale (preferably that goes over 5#) and a digital jewelers scale that will read in increments of a gram for measuring the cure in the necessarily exacting amounts. You can get both on amazon for about $12-$15 each. The jewelers scale I got goes down to 0.01 grams which is more ideal with the small amounts of cure #1 than a .1g increment scale. Speaking of cure, make sure to keep it out of reach of kids and pets. It looks inviting like kool-aid/sugar mix in a bag (we called it "cocaine" and took it everywhere in our pockets as kids for our sugar fix lol, ghetto I know, it's where I grew up), but the cure is toxic when ingested in significant amounts straight from the bag.

Next, simply convert your meat weight to grams (1# = ~455g), then weigh out your salt (+/- 2.5% of your meat weight = meat grams x 0.025), your brown sugar (+/- 1% of your meat weight = meat grams x 0.01), and your cure (EXACTLY 1/4th of 1% of your meat weight = meat grams x 0.0025).

Example with your theoretical 4.4# slabs:
4.4# x 455g = 2002 grams meat weight (let's round to 2000g for easy math.

2000g x .025 = 50 grams salt (any brand plain kosher or plain non-iodized).
2000g x .01 = 20 grams brown sugar.
2000g x .0025 = 5 grams pink cure #1.

You'll weigh each of the two slabs and calculate/mix/cure separately, so it's an opportunity to play with adjusting your salt and sugar levels to find your preferred taste. Try and stay between 2%-3% salt, and .75%-1.25% brown sugar. Don't mess with the cure level, it will give you exactly 156ppm nitrite per USDA FSIS guidelines. You can also play around with adding other spices in each batch, but honestly I find that not much of the additional flavors actually penetrate the meat at the curing stage. If I want pepper bacon, I'll usually lightly oil or maple syrup paint the slabs right towards the END of the smoke (an hour or so remaining) and pepper crust it then. Some folks will oil or syrup coat it and stick spices on before smoking, BUT in my opinion, this greatly inhibits smoke absorption into the actual meat. In my experience, when this is done the smoke all sticks to the oil/syrup/spices barrier on the outside, making the exterior bitter and the interior boring.

Anywhoo, mix the 3 dry cure ingredients thoroughly in a bowl and apply it evenly to all sides of your meat inside of a 2.5 gallon ziploc (available at Walmart). Be sure all of the cure gets on the meat and into the bag. If your meat has been previously frozen or for whatever other reason doesn't look like it's wet enough to release enough liquid to dissolve all of the dry ingredients during the curing stage, you can add a LITTLE water to help get things moving along. Just make sure you add the water weight into the meat weight in grams for the purpose of calculating your cure ingredients. 1/4 cup should be more than enough, so just add 59 grams (1c H20 = 236g, 1/4c = 59g) to your meat weight when calculating. Squeeze the air out of the bag, seal it up, massage everything to spread it around equally, and place in frig for 5 days minimum, up to 10 days if your schedule is tight. I usually cure Friday night and remove from the cure the following Friday to prepare for a Saturday smoke. You'd go shorter or longer for thinner or super thick pieces, but 5-10 days is perfect for a 2"-3" thick piece of meat. An equilibrium cure can't over/under cure in this time period as it's exactly the correct amount of salt/sugar/cure that your meat can absorb based on meat weight and absorbency potential. Make SURE to gently massage the package and flip it over once a day to redistribute the fluids and cure for even curing. When it's cured, remove from the bag (the night before you'll smoke it), give a quick cold water rinse, thoroughly pat dry, and put it unwrapped on a wire rack in your frig overnight to dry the surface and form the shiny/tacky pellicle layer. This will help it absorb smoke evenly.


The next day, prep your smoker to run at very low temp (100-125 max at grate/meat level, if you can) with plenty of smoke wood chunks to provide clean, even, consistent smoke throughout a long "warm smoke". Make sure to keep your meat away from direct rising heat, so as to not cook it, you'll cook it later after you slice and pan-fry it. I've heard of some people taking their bacon to 150IT at the end of the smoke to make it edible without further cooking, but I've never tried that, it just doesn't appeal to me! I have a homemade version of a Cajun Bandit 22" kettle insert, but taller with 2 racks, that works perfect for bacon. I use an A-Maze-N Products AMNPS pellet maze resting on my sweeper fins all the way at the bottom of my kettle to generate the smoke, and a single row briquette snake method on the perimeter of the charcoal grate to generate JUST enough heat to achieve a low temp warm smoke and create a good draft. Then i hang my meat slabs from the top rack with a deflector on the bottom rack to shield the meat from rising and radiant heat. Plenty of folks successfully warm smoke bacon with just wood chunks over charcoal though, so whatever you do will work as long as you're providing consistent clean "thin blue" smoke and minimal heat to create draft. Good airflow is critical when cold/warm smoking, as a cooler smoker doesn't draft as well and can let the smoke stagnate and make your food bitter like an ashtray if you're not careful. The balancing act is having a little heat to create draft, but not so much that your food cooks before it takes on an ideal amount of smoke. Make sure to keep your smoker in the shade to help keep temps down this time of year. For bacon at cool/warm smoke temps, 8-12 hours is ideal. You'll also start to get a feel for how much smoke flavor the bacon will end up with based on the nice rich color on the meat during the middle/end of the smoking session. The nitrite in the cure will keep your meat safe for extended periods in this otherwise "danger zone". Another tip; I buy cheap bamboo skewers to put on my cooking grate to put meat on when cold smoking food that I can't hang. Just in case there's some bacteria lurking on my cooking grate and I won't be making it hot enough to kill the bacteria. Here's some good reading on cold vs hot smoking.
http://www.smokingmeatforums.com/t/1...-and-hot-smoke

When you're all done, let the meat rest at room temp to cool, then pat dry and seal it up tight in 2.5 gallon ziplocs (or vacuum sealer bags work great if you have a foodsaver) for 1-3 days in the frig to let the smoke and moisture equalize throughout the whole slabs. Then, just before slicing, pop the bags/slabs in your freezer for 30-60 minutes to firm up nice to make slicing easier. A meat slicer is ideal, but a sharp, long knife and a steady hand will do. Make sure to slice against/across the grain of the meat or it'll be chewy. Also, since shoulder is a much more worked part of the animal, buckboard bacon tends to have a LITTLE more toothiness to it. Not much, but enough that you don't want to slice it like a thick cut belly bacon, or the thick slices will be more of a chew than most people associate with bacon. Thin slicing will alleviate/eliminate that issue.

If you vacseal your portions, they'll keep good for +/- 6 months in the freezer. Otherwise, I'm thinking maybe a month or two in tight freezer wrap, but am not sure as I vacseal.

You'll notice some sections will be much fattier than others. The fatty sections will fry like normal bacon, the leaner sections will need 2-4 Tbsp of a light oil in the skillet to help get the frying action started.
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Old 12-06-2017, 04:42 PM   #19
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Originally Posted by VanderLaan View Post
You and me, both.

Just butchered a hog and making bacon with the belly and jowls is on my to-do list. Is there a seminal thread on making bacon? Something akin to the UDS thread? If so, could someone point me to it?

Here is an earlier post I did with culinary students..
http://www.bbq-brethren.com/forum/sh...d.php?t=246208
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Old 12-06-2017, 06:35 PM   #20
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Apologies to the OP for hijacking this tasty, tasty thread. Say the word and I will start a new one.
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Old 12-06-2017, 07:13 PM   #21
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I just put on a belly yesterday to cure used the equilibrium cure I found in another thread on here. It said 3% salt, 1% sugar and the cure #1 at .025 as stated above but made no reference to brown sugar or non iodized or kosher salt. I used plain sugar and regular iodized table salt. Did I goof ?
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Old 12-06-2017, 07:40 PM   #22
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yes I am Student. Fenugreek seed is on order
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Old 12-06-2017, 07:43 PM   #23
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Apologies to the OP for hijacking this tasty, tasty thread. Say the word and I will start a new one.
No problem I am a hijacker from the "old days"
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Old 12-06-2017, 08:01 PM   #24
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http://www.bbq-brethren.com/forum/sh...ht=Charcuterie

Nothing dedicated to bacon, but there is this.
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Old 12-06-2017, 08:18 PM   #25
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I've done 7 days, no fewer. 2-3 days is too few.
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Old 12-06-2017, 08:27 PM   #26
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Originally Posted by sjb67 View Post
I just put on a belly yesterday to cure used the equilibrium cure I found in another thread on here. It said 3% salt, 1% sugar and the cure #1 at .025 as stated above but made no reference to brown sugar or non iodized or kosher salt. I used plain sugar and regular iodized table salt. Did I goof ?
Only pure natural salts should be used in curing....

Iodized salt is a poor choice, it will work, but because of the anti-caking agents (sodium aluminosilicate). They can flatten and dull flavors of the finished product.

Also sodium aluminosilicate functions by adsorbing excess moisture and by coating particles thus making them water repellent. This can also slow the curing process or cause an uneven cure.

Quote:
Originally Posted by sjb67 View Post
I found in another thread on here. It said 3% salt, 1% sugar and the cure #1 at .025 as stated above
Are you sure it was .025 ? it should be .25% which is .0025 as a multiplier....

Last edited by IamMadMan; 12-06-2017 at 08:35 PM..
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Old 12-06-2017, 08:46 PM   #27
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Only pure natural salts should be used in curing....

Iodized salt is a poor choice, it will work, but because of the anti-caking agents (sodium aluminosilicate). They can flatten and dull flavors of the finished product.

Also sodium aluminosilicate functions by adsorbing excess moisture and by coating particles thus making them water repellent. This can also slow the curing process or cause an uneven cure.



Are you sure it was .025 ? it should be .25% which is .0025 as a multiplier....
That is correct I mistyped. I used 2.5g per kilogram well hopefully it will taste ok as I have 9# in the refrigerator. Chalk it up to learning. What about white sugar vs brown sugar? Thanks and sorry for hijacking
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Old 12-06-2017, 08:54 PM   #28
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That is correct I mistyped. I used 2.5g per kilogram well hopefully it will taste ok as I have 9# in the refrigerator. Chalk it up to learning. What about white sugar vs brown sugar? Thanks and sorry for hijacking
It will taste fine, far superior to store bought bacon....

Regular sugar is ok, it's refined and it only imparts a little sweetness to cut the sharpness of the salt in the end. Brown Sugar or even Raw Sugar still carries some of the natural cane flavors, so it can impart some additional flavors. It's nothing to worry about, it's a matter of personal preference.
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Old 12-07-2017, 06:29 AM   #29
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I know many areas of Europe have unsmoked bacon (IE UK - Rashers, Germany - Bauchspeck, durchwachsener, Schinkenspeck) and is used for flavor in cooking.

After a recent trip to Europe, I realize your food purity laws are also something we could only wish for here in the US. It's a shame what we as American consumers have settled for. However the reason for the cure is two-fold...

1) Because of the extend time in refrigeration (7-10 days) cure #1 is used to prevent spoilage. Our store bought meats are trucked across country from processor, to warehouse, and then to store distribution, and our meat products are not as fresh as yours.

2) Because when smoking bacon, we usually smoke at a lower temperature gradually raising the smoker temperature over time to reach the finishing temperature of the bacon. The time in the smoker would allow the meat to be in the "danger zone" for 4 hours or more. I cold smoke my bacon for a minimum of 6 hours before applying heat, and many of us never exceed an IT of 125°.

.
Thanks for this excellent info.

When I hot smoke bacon, I use my pellet grill on smoke until the IT is 150 F, usually done within 4 hours. I have yet to try cold smoking first but probably will have to give that a go VERY SOON!
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Old 12-07-2017, 07:36 AM   #30
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Thanks for this excellent info.

When I hot smoke bacon, I use my pellet grill on smoke until the IT is 150 F, usually done within 4 hours. I have yet to try cold smoking first but probably will have to give that a go VERY SOON!
I use the A-Maze-N pellet tray, probably something similar you could make yourself there in Belgium...
https://www.amazenproducts.com/product_p/amnps5x8.htm

This produces large amounts of smoke without any heat, so there is no concern for condensation of smoke or creosote formation. It works well for cold smoking cheese, spice, fish, meat, virtually anything you want to add a smoke flavor to.

Cold smoking adds a deeper smoky flavor to the bacon. Taking it to a final internal temp of only 54° C / 130° F with heat over a long period of time, does not cook the bacon, but merely renders out some of the soft saturated fat. This helps to mildly firm the bacon and concentrate flavor. It makes slicing easier and leaves less melted fat in the pan when cooking.
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