Bacon

[bbqking]

Trying a new bacon recipe. Used some cosher salt, pepper, curing powder, and maple syrup. Let it soak about 14 days flipping every so often. Me it sit almost two days in fridge to form pellicle. On the sf right now. Will post more pics as they come.

 

[JpsBBQ]

Yeah baby!

 

[whoareya]

Looks good, should be nicely cured after 14 days. Cold Or Hot Smoking It?

 

[bbqking]

Hot smoked. About 3-4 hours at 200/smokeboost. Did about an hour or so of smoke boost. Took them all to 150. Then I to the fridge to harden up again…BLT’s tonight! Only thing bothersome is I set it at 200 and according to the SF temp it went up to 280, and didn’t go below that….I haven’t cleaned in out for about 5 cooks so maybe it needs that done…lol

 

[bbqking]

Probably the best tasting bacon I’ve made. A little sticky, a hint of sweet, great bacon flavor.

 

[abmet]

Looks amazing!

 

[rexster314]

Not to brag, but

 

[bbqking]

Not to brag, but

Yeah it seems like someone on here did some gob of bacon here awhile back…like around 20 slabs….slightly out of my league. Lol

 

[JpsBBQ]

Not to brag, but

Why so little? Slacker!

 

[bbqking]

Well I’d love to do more, but if you had to put up with constant complaining of no room in the fridge for 2 weeks…just saying. Lol

 

[abmet]

Not to brag, but

Holy moly

 

[ktskas]

I'm a little confused about the curing time. There are many different sites with many different curing times. I have seen as little as 5 days from meathead at amazingribs to bbqking here doing 14 days. How do you determine what is correct? I've got eleven pounds that have been curing for five days now.

 

[bbqking]

I have done a 7 day cure, 2 other times, with all dry ingredients. This had maple syrup. The recipe said 10-14 days, so I just did the 14. This recipe turned out the best. Don’t know if it was the time being cured or the ingredients

 

[whoareya]

I'm a little confused about the curing time. There are many different sites with many different curing times. I have seen as little as 5 days from meathead at amazingribs to bbqking here doing 14 days. How do you determine what is correct? I've got eleven pounds that have been curing for five days now.

I calculate my curing time based on the thickness of the meat . I vacpac mine after the cure has been added (much less mess & contains all the juices) just rub the outside of the packet & turn every day or you can leave on a rack over a tray in the fridege and turn every day.

I base the time on the thickest part of the meat 1/2 inch per day + 4 days whether its belly or loin I'm doing for Bacon so a 2.5 inch thick piece of meat would be 9 days and 5 inch piece of meat would be 14 days

p.s I use this calculator for calculating my cures http://www.diggingdogfarm.com/page2.html I drop the parts per million to 150 from the set 156. Otherwise just add the meat weight and it calculates the basic cure for you and you just add your own spices to the basic cure after that, before applying the cure to the meat. Never had a bad one using it and the thickness time combined yet.

 

[Dassman5]

I typically wet-cure my bacon (3x4# slabs or 12# at a time) for 5-6 days in 2 gallon freezer bags, turning each day. (By contrast the Weber Smoke book suggest wet curing for as little as 48 hours.)

For dry cure, which I seldom do any more, the cure time is typically between 10 and 14 days.

From 2 decades of experience making homemade bacon, getting the correct ration of curing salt, experimenting by adding your favorite flavorings and smoking to no more than 150F is far more important.

However, you will find myriad opinions and articles on what produces the best bacon, Irrespective of if the debate, any homemade bacon beats store-purchased by a mile. Experiment and enjoy!