curing bacon with ready cure

[saggitarian1970]

Hey to anyone who can provide some feedback

I am going to attempt my first cold smoke with bacon hopefully next week. I just put a 3 1/2 lb pork belly in some cure last night (dry cure) and will allow it to cure for about a week.
My question is if I actually used enough cure. Up here in Canada it is more difficult to get Prague powder or cure #1 but I can easily get readycure from a local grocery store that is within driving distance from my house. This stuff is only 1% nitrite so I searched for a formula as to how much to use for my belly and found one on this website.
http://www.localfoodheroes.co.uk/calculator/dry_cure_bacon/
I entered all values it requested but changed the value of cure to 150 as the max. The amount it advised me to use was just under 20g and about 16g of salt since this particular cure has a high salt content. After rubbing in the cure, placing it into a freezer bag and then to the fridge I notice on the bag of cure it recommends using 20g per kilo of meat. The calculations I was given amounted to 19.6g for almost 1.5 kilos of belly! Will this still be sufficient if I plan to cold smoke my bacon after the 7 day cure or should I mix up some more cure and apply it after a few days to be safe? And how many hours of smoking is recommended for this project? I have the Amaze-n-pellet smoker and a master forge double door propane smoker, which I just so happen to be using right now with the AMPS to cold smoke some cheese.

Thanks for any insight that you may provide

 

[themule69]

I can't say as to your amount of cure. Someone will be along soon with a answer. as to the smoke. I did 40+ hours on my last bacon with AMNPS. I will go for 60 next time Here is a link to my bacon.http://www.smokingmeatforums.com/t/...bacon-in-my-deluxe-uds-with-amnps-with-q-veiw

happy smoken

David

 

[saggitarian1970]

Up to sixty hours! WOW that's a freakishly long time. Most of the stuff I have read only suggests six to eight. How does the stuff you made taste after frying? Must be intense

 

[foamheart]

I didn't have David's patience.

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• foamheart
• Jul 13, 2013

That is 10 hours of smoke, smoker temp of 100 to 137. It only hit 137 twice in 10 hours, I had a 100 degree setting on my MES30. The aux smoke generator and the time of day drove it up. Once I tryed to use both ends of the generator at one time to increase the smoke, all it did was increase the heat load. Way I now figure is that the meat can only take some much smoke ata time everything else is just a waste of pellets.

I should have stopped at 6 or 8, but I just was loving the color, I forgot its about the meat not the color.

 

[themule69]

Up to sixty hours! WOW that's a freakishly long time. Most of the stuff I have read only suggests six to eight. How does the stuff you made taste after frying? Must be intense

No It isn't intense. I would smoke at night and let it rest during the day. I will go longer next time.

David

 

[diggingdogfarm]

So, you used 19.6 g of ReadyCure (1% nitrite) for 1.5 kilos of belly?
That's ~131ppm nitrite which is an okay amount as far was the nitrite goes.
The amount of cold smoke you put on it is a matter of personal preference, I usually only cold smoke bacon for 8-12 hours, but sometimes longer, no more than 24 hours total.



~Martin

 

[saggitarian1970]

Ok thanks guys. I was just a little concerned when I read on the bag I was supposed to use more. According to the formula I used I put about 140ppm of cure. I took a snapshot of the results and just double checked the numbers.
I don't think I'll have any problems with my temps, I did some cheese today and used a big tray of ice in there. I don't have a digital thermometer in my box and the little one I hang in there only starts at 100* and it never got close even after five hours of smoke. I was very interested to see how the smoke flows out during a cold smoke, it seems to flow really lazily along, not at all when I am doing ribs or butts.

 

[saggitarian1970]

image.jpg

• saggitarian1970
• Jul 21, 2013

There is a photo of my first try for bacon. I think it turned out really well. Dry cured In a ziplock bag in the fridge for a week flipping daily. Then taken out from bag and rinsed and soak for another two hours to cut the salt back a bit. Then sit uncovered in fridge for 24 to develop the pellicle. Take out and leave on counter for about an hour before smoking. Smoked using the Amaze-n-smoker with apple pellets for about 9 hours, slice and then do whatever you want with em.
I will experiment a bit more with this yet

 

[smoking b]

Looks perfect!  Homemade bacon is the best! 

   Nice job