Smoking and Curing

OK! This is a topic very dear to my German heart.

Anybody make/smoke or cure their meat products. I don't think that there is to much that I haven't done. When others are looking for deals in the price of gasoline etc., I'm checking out the price of Pork butt and Pork bellies!

I used to do turkey meat jerky, marinated and dehydrated. Have not done that in years since with today's industry, how safe is the meat when its not cooked (for those that dont hunt). Wanted to do Smoke fish a few years back but a smoking unit is expensive, thinking modifying a trashcan.

I have a 600 gallon LPG tank that's been converted to a smoker w/separate firebox, mounted on a boat trailer frame/wheels & that burns logs of the size that you would burn in a fireplace. = Have smoked LOTS of poultry & hogs over the last 5 decades.
(Taking feral pigs has definitely NOT slowed down the smoking at our place.)

Fwiw, in our part of Texas the wood is usually post oak, hickory or (sometimes) mesquite, btw.

yours, satx

OR IF you don't have the time, I've found these sites for Slab Bacon Site 1 and Slab Bacon Site 2. Though nowhere as good as DIY smoked, dry bacon.

LD

We make dehydrated jerky on a regular basis. I didn't deer hunt this last fall, so I watch for sales on roast beef at the local groceries and pick up several when they get to hamburger price. Our grandkids love the stuff and I like to stick some in my pocket when I'm going to be out and about.

We've also done stuffed sausages and some cured meats, but none that require smoking at this point. One of our last runs was some potato sausage.

Stillwater woodcrafts on YouTube has a good vid on making bacon, I do like his vids.

I do, on a regular basis.

I actually made some deer jerk from a previous years harvest with the anticipation of taking it with me on last weeks Disney trip. I couldn't stand it and ate it all before the trip...

My weak spot is for homemade bacon, that said I cure my pork belly in curing salts and will proceed to smoke it in my charcoal grill using true hardwood charcoal and natural woods I harvest. I do the same with other meats I'll take to events and such.

I find curing and smoking to be an enjoyable experience. There are so many personal opinions and methods to curing and smoking, to which I prefer to keep things simplified.

Give it a go, for me I love my little Weber kettle grill, does a fantastic job at smoking once set up right which is simple. Cheap and effective! :thumbsup:

I have a Bradley smoker and I look out for pork tenderloins, first choice or pork loins, second choice. When on sale here they can be bought for $2.00 a pound. Sometimes even $1.49. Laid in kosher salt plus curing salt for a week and then cold smoked they are delish and last a long time. I vacuum pack and freeze most of it and pull out about half a pound at a time for use.

My number two son bought me a pork belly so I tried curing my own bacon. It turned out a little salty for my taste, but still better than store bought bacon. While researching curing bacon, I discovered that "Canadian Bacon" is simply cured pork loin. So I tried a sugar cure and it turned out GREAT. Since they had pork loins on sale for $1.49 a lb. I made a lot of Canadian bacon. My receipe is : 5 lb. pork loin, One and 1/2 cup sugar 1/2 cup salt, two table spoons "pink salt", two table spoons molasses, in one gal water. Soak for three days, ( optional rub with course pepper before smoking )smoke at 150 degrees F, for about 15 hours .

I have a small smoker and love to smoke pork butts or shoulders. While you're smoking meat try this trick: buy three 8-ounce blocks of cheese. I like to use one pepper jack and two sharp cheddar. Put the cheese blocks side by side in a small cake pan, put the cake pan in the coldest part of the smoker. After an hour or so the cheese will have slumped down and filled the pan. Let it cool and cut into cubes. It is good!

Time to make some more for upcoming visit with BIL in Oregon. Going to use Jack Daniels for flavoring on this batch.

Thanks for the tip on smoking the cheese. I'm going to do that during the bacon smoke next week!

well.....







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LD

I am sure that this is great bacon. I like to apple wood or hickory smoke bacon more to a temperature around 155 degrees to get a deeper penetrating flavor and appearance. Everyone does it different like Mom's apple pie!

:thumbsup:

you guys are really bad influence on me. Went out last night and bought some side pork to make bacon for the first time. Just got done mixing it up and getting ready for the cure.

Also bought a brisket for smoking monday.

I have a big green egg, and they work great.

Fleener

I make "Buckboard" with a pork roast and a sugar cure. Mix 2 tbs dark brown sugar and 2 tbs Morton's tenderquick per pound of pork. Max thickness on the pork is 2 inches. Rub the mixture over the pork roast and place it in a plastic bag in a dish in the fridge. Turn it over every 12 hours for a week. Then remove it from the fridge and plastic bag, rinse it off and then put it in the smoker for a time. Hot smoke will cook the fat out of the meat, so if using a pork belly, you will lose most of the fat. I prefer a cold smoke at about 100 degrees or less for 24 hours.

Old smoke houses for cold smoking had fire boxes that were not in the smoke house, but often a few feet away with a chimney under ground to take the smoke to the smoke house and cool it at the same time. In fact the best old smokehouses were under ground, so that they stayed cool all year round. About 20 years ago, the Eastern was held down near Lovingston VA. on an old plantation. The smoke house there was about 15 ft round and 12 ft high and all under ground built into the side of a hill with just a slight chimney to the outside for smoke to release. . The firebox was a separate stone structure with a passage for the smoke to go to the smoke room.

The old story is that a Christmas ham would be butchered and preparation started a year in advance. Hanging up in the smoke house for a full year.

Those Virginia Hams were hard as a chunk of firewood and it took some to get past scraping the bits of mold from the outside. But that was the best ham taste ever. When I can get it, I still buy VA ham bits (scraps) to season other foods. Unfortunately, it is rarely found up here north of the Mason Dixon Line.

I had been smoking the cured pork belly (bacon) at about 185°F (as taught by my stepson) but will now try the lower temperatures suggested here and elsewhere.

I have done salmon, briskets, whole duck, spare ribs, tri-tips and a bunch of other stuff using hickory pellets, hickory chips, Applewood chips, cherrywood chips and alder chunks. My practice is to sweeten the curing process more if using heavy smoke and less if using light smoke to balance the bitterness of the smoking process.

Bacon rind is good for chile beans, too!

Best wishes. Dave

I smoked my bacon to 150 F sunday night, turned out great.

Fleener

Just put a small piece (about 2#) in the smoker this morning and now maintaining about 150-155° as recommended. Cured and injected with the usual ingredients and also the Jack Daniels for something different.

When it comes to smoking and curing meat, your talking my language for sure! Just finished making and smoking about 40#'s of Apple wood smoked bacon including 25#'s of Brats and 25#'s of smoked wieners
for a event later this month. Just about out of Canadian bacon, so have to start some probably next week. No Master Chief or Master Chef, but have fun and eat good! .....................so much to do and so little time!!

Rick

I have two pork butt roasts in a Traeger smoker today. I used two different recipes including one similar to yours. I don't have a cold smoker, so these are getting about a 6 hour treatment. I split the roasts in half to get uncured pieces that were about 2 inches thick. This is my first shot at this and I'm excited to see how they turn out. The local super market had the roasts on sale for $.99/lb.