Author Topic: Dry Cured Bacon  (Read 21172 times)

Pork Belly

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Dry Cured Bacon
« on: June 11, 2014, 11:40:10 AM »
Everybody doesn't have a scale so I listed different measuring options.
Basic Dry Cure
1Pound or 450 grams Kosher Salt
8 oz. or 225 Grams Sugar
2 oz. or 50 grams or 10 teaspoons Pink Salt- Sodium Nitrite

After assembling your Basic Cure you need to decide on your cut of meat. Are you doing Bellies, Loin or Boneless Pork But? It doesn't matter all these steps are the same. Take approximately two cups of you cure and pour it onto a cookie sheet. Spread the cure evenly and begin rolling and patting you choice of meat in the brine as if you were dredging meat to fry it. The cure will adhere to the meat. Continue to coat the meat until it cant hold anymore cure, adding more cure ass needed. Discard any cure that made contact with meat, store remaining cure in an airtight container.

My preferred method for the next step is take a zip top bag large enough to easily hold your cut of meat without loosing its seal. Place 1/4 cup maple syrup and 1/4 cup brown sugar inside the bag. Using your hands rub the bag mixing the sugar and syrup to coat the inside of the bag. be careful not to get sugar in the zip seal. Add your cured meat to the bag, remove as much air as you can and add the meat. Insure you have a good seal and place in a container large enough to hold any leaks. The container of bagged meat should remain in the fridge for seven days. Each day visit the fridge admire what you crafted and flip the bag over. Multiple bags can be stacked if needed. On The seventh Day remove the meat from the bags, rinse it well under cold water and immediately pat it dry with paper-towels. Return the meat to the fridge and place it directly on the racks of without covering it. There wont be any leaching or dripping don't panic. The meat should remain in this step for at least 24 hours longer is not harmful. The meat is cured, it is preserved now. Leaving it in the fridge allows for it to dry enough for the smoke to adhere. Continued storage in this manner just removes more moisture and concentrates the flavors.

I prefer to load cold meat in a cold smoker then Cold smoke at 100 for 2 hours minimum. I then bump up the heat to 200 and cook to an internal temp of 150 on a probe thermometer. Remove from the smoker and remove the skin from the belly if there is one. I always leave the skin on until this stage. Now place the meat on racks and cookie sheets place in fridge covered loosely with wax paper for 24 hours before slicing. Use a slicer if you have one if not an extremely sharp knife works also.
« Last Edit: January 04, 2015, 12:05:06 PM by Pork Belly »
Brian - Michigan-NRA Life Member
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Pork Belly

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Re: Dry Cured Bacon
« Reply #1 on: June 11, 2014, 11:57:55 AM »
When it comes out of the smoker your pork is fully cured and cooked and can be eaten as is. I recommend taste testing before you put it in the fridge, because its awesome at this point.

When crisping or frying the bacon it should be done on a medium heat don't rush it or the sugars will burn.
The boneless butt should be sliced and fried like bacon. You know its marbled with fat so it will be good, its just not pork belly. The loins can be sliced thick and pan seared, or sliced thin and eaten cold on sandwiches or crackers.

So now lets switch it up a bit, if you don't like a sweet bacon skip that step. How about adding a heavy load of black pepper after you have applied the dry cure? The curing step preserves it, the flavor step is personal choice. Add some more black pepper after you rinse and pat dry if you like.

Here is something, Cure it but don't smoke it. Complete the dredging in cure then zip it up with a few tablespoons of crushed garlic, some chopped fresh herbs of you choosing and some black pepper.  Seal it up and do the seven day flip. Rinse and pat dry(little bits may stick that's OK) throw on a bit more pepper. Poke a few holes in it to run some butchers twine through it and hang for additional drying in your pantry, or any cool dry place. You just made Panchetta Tessa, a dry cured Italian bacon. For Tessa I prefer a three pound piece of belly it gets used in about six meals.  The Italians also roll Panchetta into stylish rounds of spiraled belly but that's a different lesson.
Brian - Michigan-NRA Life Member
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Walt

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Re: Dry Cured Bacon
« Reply #2 on: June 11, 2014, 02:02:44 PM »
Interesting, thorough and sounds delicious.  Good to have you here, PB.
Walt from South East Louisiana
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DivotMaker

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Re: Dry Cured Bacon
« Reply #3 on: June 11, 2014, 10:43:10 PM »
Looks like a great method, Brian!
Tony from NW Arkansas
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Pork Belly

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Re: Dry Cured Bacon
« Reply #4 on: June 12, 2014, 08:52:09 AM »
Thanks for the comments. I have been reading some of the wet brine bacon posts. I admit I have not tried it that way. I am sure you guys are enjoying what your making, but I don't think I am going down that road. I would like to taste it but just not going to commit to a large batch.

As I understand it and have applied the method, we brine to increase moisture. We have all talked about that, in the poultry section especially. Traditionally the bellies and hams were hand rubbed with salt to release moisture. The meat sat on crude shelves or benches in the smoke house where this moisture was allowed to drain away. After the meat had cured it was smoked to enhance preservation and smoke tasted good. It tastes great actually that is why bacon is so popular and salt pork has faded away. Wet brined bacon sometimes injected, is actually a commercial operation practice.

The method I use is actually a combination of the old style and your brine. The salt is rubbed into the meat and it begins to shed moisture. What ever flavoring ingredient you have added mingles with that released water and forms a slurry that surrounds the meat. The meat then absorbs the flavors you have applied. Sometimes a belly will give off a few cups of moisture, some give hardly any just depends on the pig. I see a big difference in commercial production (wetter) and small farm heritage pigs.

The next step is letting it chill out in the fridge on a rack for a day or two to loose moisture and crust up a bit. If the second to the last step is to dry the meat, I personally don't want to take it for a 12 day swim. For a thinner belly I could do a six day cure, I'm running seven days on bellies that average two inches thick.

I would post some pics but it keeps telling me they are too big. I got others to post just not of the bacon.
Brian - Michigan-NRA Life Member
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NDKoze

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Re: Dry Cured Bacon
« Reply #5 on: June 12, 2014, 10:38:37 AM »
I recently made a batch of Buckboard Bacon (Boston Butt) with a wet brine and it was absolutely fantastic.

The brining is just so easy and I know that I am getting a uniform penetration of the meat.

I know there are a lot of bacon purists out there like you and others and that is fine. I'm gonna stick with the wet brining. I like my BBB as well as any belly bacon that I have had. So, I am not sure if I will ever bother with a belly unless I find a great deal on some.

Really cool post/recipe you have here though.
Gregg - Fargo, ND
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Pork Belly

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Re: Dry Cured Bacon
« Reply #6 on: June 22, 2014, 01:21:40 PM »
I started a batch of bacon today so I took the time to get some pictures to illustrate the process. I am doing two large pieces of belly and a good size piece of collar. Collar is the meaty section from behind the hogs head before the shoulder.

Today I am using a meat lug and not zip top bags due to the size of the bellies. I will still flip them every day for seven days as the recipe calls for
Brian - Michigan-NRA Life Member
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Pork Belly

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Re: Dry Cured Bacon
« Reply #7 on: July 01, 2014, 08:40:57 PM »
I wanted to post an update on my last batch of bacon. The two sections of belly and half of a pork collar have been refrigerated, resting and rotating in a meat lug (big tub) for seven days. After a rinse and pat dry the hung out in the fridge uncovered on the rack for 48 hours. That is an extra 24, but I had a thermometer failure and couldn't smoke them until I replaced it, nothing hurt by waiting. The meat is preserved by curing and just requires the smoke for flavor. I started with 4.7 oz of sugar maple at 145 for two hours the upped the temp to 200 and continued to cook until I reached 150 IT.

I started with the probe in the collar as it was the thinnest and switched it as pieces hit the correct IT. The pictures I am posting are of the collar. I hand sliced some for BLT's. I used a baking sheet and rack in a 400 oven for 12 minutes.
Brian - Michigan-NRA Life Member
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DivotMaker

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Re: Dry Cured Bacon
« Reply #8 on: July 01, 2014, 08:52:29 PM »
Oh, baby!! ;D ;D Nice job!
Tony from NW Arkansas
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Pork Belly

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Re: Dry Cured Bacon
« Reply #9 on: July 01, 2014, 10:00:07 PM »
Thank You, I fired up the my 1945 Hobart 210 slicer and this is what I had fifteen minutes later. This was the best batch of bacon I have done. I had good results in the past on a Trager or in a Bradley But I can tell by the condition of the fat cap on the bellies that my #3 was not giving me the high temperature spikes I had in the other brands. There was no melting of the fat cap, or dry ends or edges on the meat layer.
« Last Edit: July 02, 2014, 01:16:33 AM by Pork Belly »
Brian - Michigan-NRA Life Member
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bigbassnutt

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Re: Dry Cured Bacon
« Reply #10 on: July 02, 2014, 05:20:17 AM »
Wow, that looks really good. Thanks for sharing Brian.
Mike in Indiana
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DivotMaker

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Re: Dry Cured Bacon
« Reply #11 on: July 02, 2014, 08:02:32 PM »
Those top 2 pics, especially, look like they're right out of a food magazine!  Great color, and very appetizing!
Tony from NW Arkansas
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BedouinBob

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Re: Dry Cured Bacon
« Reply #12 on: September 20, 2014, 04:59:46 PM »
Hey Brian, currently working your dry cured bacon. In the #2 as we speak. I will post pics when done. Can you tell me if you have used cold smoke for bacon? If so, I would like to give it a shot. How is it done with cold smoke? What's the difference in flavor?
Bob - Colorado Springs
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Pork Belly

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Re: Dry Cured Bacon
« Reply #13 on: September 21, 2014, 01:15:34 AM »
I have in the past but did not on this batch. I have done 2 to 4 hours of cold smoke then ran it at 200 until 150 IT. The weather has not allowed me to do a prolonged cold smoke. I want the ambient temp below 40 for that.
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gregbooras

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Re: Dry Cured Bacon
« Reply #14 on: May 19, 2015, 01:05:12 PM »
Everybody doesn't have a scale so I listed different measuring options.
Basic Dry Cure
1Pound or 450 grams Kosher Salt
8 oz. or 225 Grams Sugar
2 oz. or 50 grams or 10 teaspoons Pink Salt- Sodium Nitrite

After assembling your Basic Cure you need to decide on your cut of meat. Are you doing Bellies, Loin or Boneless Pork But? It doesn't matter all these steps are the same. Take approximately two cups of you cure and pour it onto a cookie sheet. Spread the cure evenly and begin rolling and patting you choice of meat in the brine as if you were dredging meat to fry it. The cure will adhere to the meat. Continue to coat the meat until it cant hold anymore cure, adding more cure ass needed. Discard any cure that made contact with meat, store remaining cure in an airtight container.

My preferred method for the next step is take a zip top bag large enough to easily hold your cut of meat without loosing its seal. Place 1/4 cup maple syrup and 1/4 cup brown sugar inside the bag. Using your hands rub the bag mixing the sugar and syrup to coat the inside of the bag. be careful not to get sugar in the zip seal. Add your cured meat to the bag, remove as much air as you can and add the meat. Insure you have a good seal and place in a container large enough to hold any leaks. The container of bagged meat should remain in the fridge for seven days. Each day visit the fridge admire what you crafted and flip the bag over. Multiple bags can be stacked if needed. On The seventh Day remove the meat from the bags, rinse it well under cold water and immediately pat it dry with paper-towels. Return the meat to the fridge and place it directly on the racks of without covering it. There wont be any leaching or dripping don't panic. The meat should remain in this step for at least 24 hours longer is not harmful. The meat is cured, it is preserved now. Leaving it in the fridge allows for it to dry enough for the smoke to adhere. Continued storage in this manner just removes more moisture and concentrates the flavors.

I prefer to load cold meat in a cold smoker then Cold smoke at 100 for 2 hours minimum. I then bump up the heat to 200 and cook to an internal temp of 150 on a probe thermometer. Remove from the smoker and remove the skin from the belly if there is one. I always leave the skin on until this stage. Now place the meat on racks and cookie sheets place in fridge covered loosely with wax paper for 24 hours before slicing. Use a slicer if you have one if not an extremely sharp knife works also.

Brian,

I bought a 4 lb trimmed belly at the butcher shop today. How much of the cure above will I need?

Thanks Greg