traditional bacon curing,step by step.

[fishfish]

if you go to sainsburys in the week take a look at the bacon isle,everything from basics at 99p a pound to dutchy originals dry cure bacon at over £18.00 per Lb!!!!!!!!!!! most bacon these days isnt realy bacon as we think of it,pork is injected with brine and left for 24 hours then sliced and packed,thats what the white scum is when you cook it! also the brine adds weight!so you are paying for water!!!! . also mixed into the brine are artificial preservatives,the product needs this as it isnt realy cured and there fore will go off when not in a vac pack! even dry cures contain preservatives in the salt rub.I for one am allergic to the preservatives and cant eat bacon baught from the shop!!!
last year i worked at a farm shop cutting plant and there i was given the job of bacon curer,and it is realy easy! i cant see how the shops can get away with the price! i started to make my own bacon at home,minus the preservatives in the rub as i now make my own rub mix.
i usually on a weekly basis make 14lb of dry cured streaky bacon and it takes only 30 minutes! it will take 4 days to cure then i smoke it.
below is the basics of bacon making.pork,rubs and knife

firstly the ribs need cutting off and put aside for the BBQ,your butcher will gladly do this for you.also trim the flare fat and trim any mis-shaped edges off the piece.

next turn the meat skin side up,and stab/ pierce the skin all over with a knife point,dont go too deep 1cm should do!(It helps to think of 'psyco'shower scene!)

next spinkle the rub mix libraly onto the skin side and rub in hard ,pushing the rub in with the heel of yer hand:

next turn the meat over and repeat the process,ensuring that you rub the mix into all the seams and folds.

not forgetting the sides of the meat,use plenty of rub,dont be shy!!!

and here you have the final product ! best hung in a fridge or outside in the winter,when hhanging outside i put it in a pillow case to keep the bugs off! in the summer i just pop mine in a bag and place in the bottom of the fridge for 4 days,at which time i pat it dry with a cloth and smoke it,its ready to try now and is fine if you like 'green' bacon.

 

[BushTucker]

Lovely tutorial there mate, am I right with garlic salt, salt but the other ingrediant is a mystery...

Any help with the smoking part, I have never done this and would love to give it a go.

 

[lavrentyuk]

Last time I made some I used a bit of dry Jerk spice as well. I am told that a small amount of Saltpetre should be used too and there is a website somewhere that flogs it. I do tend do do the salt thing for about a week, rubbing in more daily and turning the meat.

It does work out very salty. For those of us living in range of Carmarthen it is very much like the 'Welsh/Salt' bacon sold in the Market there. Lovely. No white scum when cooked and an excellent ingredient for cooking.

Now I fancy making some more.

 

[fishy1]

What cut of pork do you use?

 

[fishfish]

Lovely tutorial there mate, am I right with garlic salt, salt but the other ingrediant is a mystery...

Any help with the smoking part, I have never done this and would love to give it a go.

no garlic in this one mate,the jar that looks like it is actually a cure called 'bay on salt'.

heres my cure rub recipe:

2lb salt,
6 cloves,*
12 bay leaves,*
8 table spoons juniper berries,*
8 table spoons thyme,*
1 table spoon black pepper corns,*
2 table spoons dark brown sugar,
* grind to a course look.
then mix all together,this cure can benifit from leaving for a couple of days for the salt to drawout the juniper ,but i have used it streight away.this amount of rub should do up to 6 loins,or more.

as for the smoking,well its realy quite easy,can you get yer hands on a 50 gallon oil drum?

 

[Toadflax]

We made a batch last year and it was very good http://www.bushcraftuk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=20751&highlight=bacon - except for being rather salty. The 'recipe' we used was from one of HF-W's books, and I think he suggested a shorter curing time if it was too salty, though I don't know then how well the bacon would keep if it was cured less.

Any thoughts on making less salty bacon?


Geoff

 

[fishfish]

We made a batch last year and it was very good http://www.bushcraftuk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=20751&highlight=bacon - except for being rather salty. The 'recipe' we used was from one of HF-W's books, and I think he suggested a shorter curing time if it was too salty, though I don't know then how well the bacon would keep if it was cured less.

Any thoughts on making less salty bacon?


Geoff

yep! less time! i hang for 3 days then wipe or rinse the excess salt off.this time of cure will keep weeks in the fridge .smoking will help it keep longer. if the salt isnt rinsed off it will cure better taste saltier but i have some hanging in the kitchen(ie not chilled) since the first week in december and its dried lovely and is infact realy good!

 

[Nagual]

Sounds really interesting. Our local butcher used to be really great but he sold up and the new guy just isn't the same, even the bacon he sells is prepacked stuff full of cack.

How do you go about the smoking part, I'm sure many of use would love to know that part too..


Cheers, Nagual.

 

[fishfish]

What cut of pork do you use?

in the picture is awhole belly,but loin is good too and makes back bacon.

 

[fishfish]

Sounds really interesting. Our local butcher used to be really great but he sold up and the new guy just isn't the same, even the bacon he sells is prepacked stuff full of cack.
How do you go about the smoking part, I'm sure many of use would love to know that part too..
Cheers, Nagual.

heres a link for how to smoke the meat.
http://www.bushcraftuk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=27685

 

[Toadflax]

yep! less time! i hang for 3 days then wipe or rinse the excess salt off.this time of cure will keep weeks in the fridge .

Thanks very much. We'll try that next time.

Geoff

 

[nicodiemus]

Good stuff, FishFish.

This is presumably closer to the stuff frontiersmen and trappers used for long months away from civilisation.

 

[fishfish]

wel nic,if salted longer and smoked longer yes.

 

[Pharaoh]

Hi people.

As of today I'm new on this forum but have been a long time lurker.
I've been making (smoking) bacon for a very long time and thought I'd chip in with my two cents.
Making basic old style time honored bacon is fairly easy to do and doesn't require very much set-up wise.

Here is what I do.

Dissolve 2,5 to 3 cups of table salt and one tablespoon of saltpeter (KNO3, from pharmacist) in a bucket of cold water. The saltpeter prevents the meat from turning gray from the salt and also makes it keep longer.
Dunk the meat in and let sit overnight in a cool place (fridge).
Drain and pat dry.
Smoke in store bought or self constructed (charcoal) smoker for 35 to 45 minutes (depending on taste) over my personal favorite woodmix 75% hickory and 25% mesquite, or hardwoods of your choice. If using seasoned fruitwoods I recommend smoking longer, say up to 1 hour.
Let cool and store in fridge or freezer (prefferably vacuum-packed for long time storage in freezer to prevent dehydration).

When preparing bacon for breakfast be sure to use real butter, not oil or other. It will taste so much better.

There's not much that can go wrong, other than what your bathroom scale will tell you after consuming more than your fair share of this stuff !

Enjoy.
Regards, Pharaoh.

 

[Matt Weir]

I'm having a Homer (Simpson) moment over the bacon, thanks fishfish.

And hello to Pharaoh

 

[sparkplug]

I also make my own bacon and can try to pick up on some of the questions raised in earlier posts.

I use coarse sea salt and coarse ground black pepper for my cure. I've tried juniper berries and bay leaves etc but to be honest I can't say that I can taste a difference in the finished product so I stopped bothering with it.

It's important to do the curing in a non-metallic container to prevent the salt reacting with it. Plastic or stoneware works perfectly.

3-4 days curing (pour away excess liquid and turn and re-coat the meat with cure mix daily) is fine. The bacon doesn't need to be smoked and can be eaten straight away.

for those who are trying to source saltpeter (which as mentioned above is used for essentially cosmetic purposes) can find it at http://www.sausagemaking.org/acatalog/Saltpetre__500_grammes.html (oh and making your own sausages is great fun!)

Too salty? Slice your bacon to your preferred thickness and then soak it in cold water for a while. The time depends on how thick your slice is and how salty you like it. I slice fairly thickly and found that 20 mins is about right for me.

Smoking - this requires some special equipment, unless you are fortunate enough to have a wood fire in your house with some access to the chimney. You essentially need a flow of *cool* smoke to pass over the meat for a period of time. If your meat is too close to the heat source it will cook.

Basic cold smokers can be made from something as basic and cheap as a large cardboard box with small holes punched in the top (pencil sized). Sawdust is placed in a metal container and heated with something like a camp stove to produce smoke. Cover this loosely with another cardboard box (or wood or whatever) and channel the smoke into the bottom of the 'smoking' box using something like a tumble drier tube (around £10). It helps if your 'smoking box' is raised slightly to encourage the smoke to draw into it and over the meat.

you can create hanging racks for your meat by simply poking long skewers or whatever through the 'smoking box'

There are a huge number of homemade designs and it can be great fun to make your own. Another classic is to convert a metal bin like this http://cruftbox.com/cruft/docs/elecsmoker.html

I have a few smokers and also use a Bradley Smoker. There's a huge amount of information about smoking there and although a lot of it is specific to the Bradley unit there is a wealth of more general knowledge which can be applied to any smoker.
http://forum.bradleysmoker.co.uk/

*phew*

Hope that some of you are inspired to try what is a very simple, cost effective and enjoyable way of producing something which tastes better than anything you can buy in the shops!

 

[fishfish]

some usefull imput thanks chaps!

 

[fishfish]

time for a bump?

 

[Tony]

Time for some more great how to's as well fishfish

 

[fishfish]

given the current advice from the World health authority about avoiding processed meats due to the potassium nitrate (saltpeter (KNO3) which is just to keep meat pink,i thought it would be a good time to dust this article off!