mpedrummer
Well-known member
- Joined
- May 9, 2016
- Location
- Pittsburgh, PA
Hi all! This is a repost from something I added to /r/smoking on reddit, but I thought you guys might be interested, too.
Our "standard" recipe was converted from an excess-salt style - "about 1c sugar per pound", that sort of thing. We wanted a more repeatable procedure, so after some delicious algebra, we ended up with a cure that was 15% brown sugar (15% of the meat weight, that is). That was absurdly high, and even left undissolved sugar in the end. So, we lowered it to 11% and called it good.
Fast forward, we tried to adjust the recipe to be sugar-free, for a friend with diet needs, and holy heck it was disgusting. WAY too salty.
So we set up this experiment to try to learn about the interaction of salts and sugars in the cure. We did our standard cure with 6 different percentages of brown sugar.
1%, 3%, 5%, 7%, and 9%, plus 11% which is not in the picture.
All were done with ~3.5% salts (kosher salt plus sodium nitrite for 181ppm). Each slab was weighed, then the cure ingredients were applied proportionally. We use the equilibrium method, if you want to Google it.
Left to right, 1 - 11%. Very little visual difference.
Unfortunately, I didn't think to get a picture, but the amount of liquid pulled from the slab was also nicely proportional, until we got to 9%. There wasn't a significant difference between 9 and 11%
The hardest part was keeping track in the pan
I love it when a plan comes together. This test shows the differences pretty clearly in our taste test. 9% and 11% tasted much the same - I think there's simply a maximum amount the meat could absorb.
From 9% down, the bacons taste increasingly salty. At 3%, it became "too salty" for our initial testers, and 1% was frankly gross.
Based on the weight gain of the slabs during the cure process, which was also a nice curve correlating with sugar percentage, I believe that higher sugar content is actually preventing the salt from being absorbed, rather than merely masking the taste of salt by being sweeter. The higher sugar content cures had less weight gain, 9% and 11% actually had weight loss.
My wife and I chose different favorites (I chose 5%, she chose 7%), but I like salty/savory more, and she prefers sweets. We both agreed that 5% and 7% are the ones to go with. Above is too sweet, below is too salty. We're having friends over for a bacon party this weekend to taste and vote.
Our "standard" recipe was converted from an excess-salt style - "about 1c sugar per pound", that sort of thing. We wanted a more repeatable procedure, so after some delicious algebra, we ended up with a cure that was 15% brown sugar (15% of the meat weight, that is). That was absurdly high, and even left undissolved sugar in the end. So, we lowered it to 11% and called it good.
Fast forward, we tried to adjust the recipe to be sugar-free, for a friend with diet needs, and holy heck it was disgusting. WAY too salty.
So we set up this experiment to try to learn about the interaction of salts and sugars in the cure. We did our standard cure with 6 different percentages of brown sugar.
1%, 3%, 5%, 7%, and 9%, plus 11% which is not in the picture.
All were done with ~3.5% salts (kosher salt plus sodium nitrite for 181ppm). Each slab was weighed, then the cure ingredients were applied proportionally. We use the equilibrium method, if you want to Google it.
Left to right, 1 - 11%. Very little visual difference.
Unfortunately, I didn't think to get a picture, but the amount of liquid pulled from the slab was also nicely proportional, until we got to 9%. There wasn't a significant difference between 9 and 11%
The hardest part was keeping track in the pan
I love it when a plan comes together. This test shows the differences pretty clearly in our taste test. 9% and 11% tasted much the same - I think there's simply a maximum amount the meat could absorb.
From 9% down, the bacons taste increasingly salty. At 3%, it became "too salty" for our initial testers, and 1% was frankly gross.
Based on the weight gain of the slabs during the cure process, which was also a nice curve correlating with sugar percentage, I believe that higher sugar content is actually preventing the salt from being absorbed, rather than merely masking the taste of salt by being sweeter. The higher sugar content cures had less weight gain, 9% and 11% actually had weight loss.
My wife and I chose different favorites (I chose 5%, she chose 7%), but I like salty/savory more, and she prefers sweets. We both agreed that 5% and 7% are the ones to go with. Above is too sweet, below is too salty. We're having friends over for a bacon party this weekend to taste and vote.
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