• Follow us on Twitter @buckeyeplanet and @bp_recruiting, like us on Facebook! Enjoy a post or article, recommend it to others! BP is only as strong as its community, and we only promote by word of mouth, so share away!
  • Consider registering! Fewer and higher quality ads, no emails you don't want, access to all the forums, download game torrents, private messages, polls, Sportsbook, etc. Even if you just want to lurk, there are a lot of good reasons to register!

Bacon: American Treasure or Work of the Devil?

ORD_Buckeye;2142630; said:
I'm making my own bacon with about 7 pounds of pork belly that I bought.

5 1/2 pounds will get applewood smoked on Saturday when it comes out of the cure.

The other 1 1/2 pound piece will get rolled, tied and hung for pancetta.

Very interesting...

Assuming you have a back-yard or patio-sized smoker, and not a smoke house (for lack of better terms)? Where did you get your pork belly? Do you have a basement for hanging?
 
Upvote 0
I'm going to smoke the bacon on a Weber. Nothing fancy.

No basement--I'm on the top floor of a six-flat. I'm going to hang the pancetta in a cool kitchen closet. Natural humidity should be about right.

The pork belly came from Andy's Fruit Ranch on Kedzie and Lawrence. If you want large pieces you have to ask the butchers. Also, it will come with the skin on.
 
Upvote 0
ORD_Buckeye;2142645; said:
I'm going to smoke the bacon on a Weber. Nothing fancy.

No basement--I'm on the top floor of a six-flat. I'm going to hang the pancetta in a cool kitchen closet. Natural humidity should be about right.

The pork belly came from Andy's Fruit Ranch on Kedzie and Lawrence. If you want large pieces you have to ask the butchers. Also, it will come with the skin on.

Thank you very much, good sir.
 
Upvote 0
If you're going to cook or smoke it after curing, just leave the skin on. It'll come off easily afterwards and make good crispy bits to add to a salad. Might make good dog treats too.

I took the skin off the pancetta bound piece, and it was fairly easy with a sharp knife.
 
Upvote 0
ORD_Buckeye;2142711; said:
If you're going to cook or smoke it after curing, just leave the skin on. It'll come off easily afterwards and make good crispy bits to add to a salad. Might make good dog treats too.

I took the skin off the pancetta bound piece, and it was fairly easy with a sharp knife.

You don't have to divulge any secrets, but I'm guessing your cure was a mixture of salt and spice mix? Any tips on the kind of salt or salt/lbs meat ratio?
 
Upvote 0
BusNative;2142715; said:
You don't have to divulge any secrets, but I'm guessing your cure was a mixture of salt and spice mix? Any tips on the kind of salt or salt/lbs meat ratio?

You have to use pink salt. That's the Prague #2 curing salt NOT Himalayan pink salt. It's dirt cheap, and you can pick it up at the Spice House on Wells. It's also--if ingested directly--toxic. So make sure you keep it in a sealed jar away from kids, pets etc. This does two things. First of all it gives it the bright red color and makes it taste like bacon instead of salted and cooked meat. Secondly, and possibly more important, it prevents botulism.

The basic ratio for a curing mix is (by weight!) 8:4:1.2 Kosher salt to sugar to curing salt. Use 4 to 5 percent of the weight of the meat to be cured. To this you can add your other curing ingredients. I'm going with toasted and roughly cracked black peppercorns, garlic, brown sugar, crushed juniper berries and thyme.

Into a non-reactive container (or large ziploc) for a week in the fridge. Every other day, reach in and redistribute the cure and really work it into the meat. At the end of the week, pull it out, rinse off the cure thoroughly (some say that--after rinsing--you should soak it in room temp water for 15 to 30 minutes to prevent the final product from being too salty), then cook, smoke or hang.

I'm using Michael Ruhlman's book Charcuterie as a reference point.

102814467.jpg
 
Upvote 0
ORD_Buckeye;2142735; said:
You have to use pink salt. That's the Prague #2 curing salt NOT Himalayan pink salt. It's dirt cheap, and you can pick it up at the Spice House on Wells. It's also--if ingested directly--toxic. So make sure you keep it in a sealed jar away from kids, pets etc. This does two things. First of all it gives it the bright red color and makes it taste like bacon instead of salted and cooked meat. Secondly, and possibly more important, it prevents botulism.

The basic ratio for a curing mix is (by weight!) 8:4:1.2 Kosher salt to sugar to curing salt. Use 4 to 5 percent of the weight of the meat to be cured. To this you can add your other curing ingredients. I'm going with toasted and roughly cracked black peppercorns, garlic, brown sugar, crushed juniper berries and thyme.

Into a non-reactive container (or large ziploc) for a week in the fridge. Every other day, reach in and redistribute the cure and really work it into the meat. At the end of the week, pull it out, rinse off the cure thoroughly (some say that--after rinsing--you should soak it in room temp water for 15 to 30 minutes to prevent the final product from being too salty), then cook, smoke or hang.

I'm using Michael Ruhlman's book Charcuterie as a reference point.

102814467.jpg

This is great, thanks again ORD.
 
Upvote 0
BusNative;2142773; said:
Just so I'm clear, the curing salt is rinsed away, and that's enough to de-tox the cured meat?

The heat of the cooking process neutralizes the nitrites. At least, that's what I vaguely remember from my days working in a smokehouse about 20 years ago.

EDIT - pretty much every cured meat from lunch meat to bacon to pepperoni to jerky to ham has been cured with nitrites - presuming you bought it commercially. It's very common, and only harmless raw.
 
Upvote 0
knapplc;2142775; said:
EDIT - pretty much every cured meat from lunch meat to bacon to pepperoni to jerky to ham has been cured with nitrites - presuming you bought it commercially. It's very common, and only harmless raw.

Aside from suspected carcinogenic issues with nitrates and nitrites (which happen to be the bulk of the issues with processed meats). :wink:
 
Upvote 0
muffler dragon;2142791; said:
Aside from suspected carcinogenic issues with nitrates and nitrites (which happen to be the bulk of the issues with processed meats). :wink:

I'd rather live with cancer than without bacon. Fucking hippie.
 
Upvote 0
Back
Top