First try bacon

[hagar]

Hello all! Well I thought I would try out makin bacon. So I found this great forum and Pop's wet brine recipe. Needless to say I have learned quite a bit from everyone that has been posting. I got a nice pork belly from Costco about 9# cut it into quarters, put each piece into a ziploc and added Pop's brine to each. I cured them for 12 days (oops forgot to do a fry test) newbie mistake. Then I rinsed the belly, dried and added fresh ground pepper to one and honey garlic to another, i left 2 plain. Put on some racks for pellicle for 2 days.

I have a Traeger Texas with a Smoking Wedgie for cold smoking. So I lit one end of the wedgie with hickory pellets and put the bacon in for a nice slow cold smoke. Hope it turns out!

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[SmokinAl]

Nice looking belly!

Hard to find thick ones around here.

Al

 

[hagar]

Wow what can I say, Pop's brine is amazing! 20 days start to finish, in and out of cold smoke several times. I have the bacon itch and will be definitly be making more.

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[bena]

Nice post and great looking Bacon!

 

[japanfan]

How long did you cold smoke it?  I have been thinking of making some bacon but not sure how long to smoke it.  Should it only be cold smoke are do you add any heat to the process?

 

[hagar]

Well for my first time I tried to keep the temp around 70. We had some warm weather and the temp was getting warmer than I wanted. So I pulled the bacon off and put it back in the fridge. I cold smoked it again after the sun went down for a few hours. Put it back in the fridge for the night and did the whole thing over the next day. I probably cold smoked for around 10 hours. Great smoke flavor!

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[redheelerdog]

Looks really amazing, great job.

 

[disco]

Great looking bacon particularly for a first go.

You were lucky you found these forums. I started smoking before I found the info here and my first efforts weren't as good as this!

I do advised that you are doomed now. You have a smoking addiction and there is no cure!

Points for a great bacon.

Disco