FS Cure injection

[tallbm]

Thank you, sir!

Don't get me goin with the Lox - that is something else I miss from back home, dearly, on a real garlic bagel, with cream cheese...

The weather outlook may be good for smoking a couple slabs of bacon in a couple/few weeks (it's always so damned warm here) so I will keep my fingers crossed.

Yeah good Lox is amazing!

Good luck with the smoking on the bacon.
I'm almost due for some. I hot smoke mine though and take it to 140-145F IT so I can eat the meat whether it's fried or not. I tell people it's "Bacon Cold Cuts" so they get over their misconception that it's "raw". 1 slice and they no longer care and usually eat at least half a pack of the stuff hahaha :D

 

[DougE]

tallbm

Question: I have always used a dry cure for bacon - can I use the same calculation criteria on Digging Dog minus the water weight? Do you increase / decrease salt or sugar for bacon?

I may have misunderstood something in the exchange. If you're wanting to use the calc to do a dry cure on bacon, then just run the meat weight through it. Adjust salt and sugar to taste but I wouldn't go below 1.5% total salt (it totals salt + cure in its calculation).

That's what it was designed for, but you could formulate a wet cure with it as well by including the water weight with the meat weight.

 

[tallbm]

I may have misunderstood something in the exchange. If you're wanting to use the calc to do a dry cure on bacon, then just run the meat weight through it. Adjust salt and sugar to taste but I wouldn't go below 1.5% total salt (it totals salt + cure in its calculation).

That's what it was designed for, but you could formulate a wet cure with it as well by including the water weight with the meat weight.

Yep.

Same calculator just need to include water and meat weight if doing the the wet cure :D

 

[Retired Spook]

tallbm same 1/4" per day for the timing?

 

[DougE]

Actually 1/4in. per side per day since you're applying the cure all the way around. Minimum for a 2 in. thick slab would be 4 days, plus a day for safety, but that's the minimum for a full cure. Going longer gives you better flavor development, which is why I generally go 14 days on mine.

 

[tallbm]

tallbm same 1/4" per day for the timing?

DougE describes it well.

1/4 inch from all sides per 24hrs.

So a flat piece of meat like pork belly would get 1/4inch from top and 1/4 inch from the bottom (and 1/4 inch from left and right sides) so you get a total of 1/2 inch coverge going top to bottom. So a 1 inch thick pork belly would take 2 days to cure from top to bottom (1/2 inch top down and 1/2 inch bottom up = 1inch of thickness) and then 1 extra day to make sure.

Now when you wet cure and you inject your curing solution like craze all throughout the meat well you then are putting cure and salt inside the meat so now you are getting 1/4 travel inside the meat in all directions, everywhere you injected.
So now you get the inside cure spredding and then the liquid from the outside of the meat penetrating outside in. You get MUCH faster cure times like this and it's necessary for thick pieces of meat like when doing hams and such.

Let me know if this explains it well :)

 

[Retired Spook]

I will start a new thread when this is all smoked and sliced but here is my 5.38-lb pork belly with 6.09gm of cure #1, 34.55gm of Kosher salt, and 24.4gm of dark brown sugar (per digging dog calculator salt adjusted to 1.65%).

Just went into the fridge.

 

[SmokinEdge]

DougE describes it well.

1/4 inch from all sides per 24hrs.

So a flat piece of meat like pork belly would get 1/4inch from top and 1/4 inch from the bottom (and 1/4 inch from left and right sides) so you get a total of 1/2 inch coverge going top to bottom. So a 1 inch thick pork belly would take 2 days to cure from top to bottom (1/2 inch top down and 1/2 inch bottom up = 1inch of thickness) and then 1 extra day to make sure.

Now when you wet cure and you inject your curing solution like craze all throughout the meat well you then are putting cure and salt inside the meat so now you are getting 1/4 travel inside the meat in all directions, everywhere you injected.
So now you get the inside cure spredding and then the liquid from the outside of the meat penetrating outside in. You get MUCH faster cure times like this and it's necessary for thick pieces of meat like when doing hams and such.

Let me know if this explains it well :)

This is factual, however I’ve found that by encouraging new to curing folks to stick to the 1/4” per day plus 2 days for safety will net them a much better product because this extra time allows for flavor development. Also I’ll add that the 1/4” per day is really based on a high salt concentration, around 2.5-3%. Salt is the driver of diffusion and osmosis, the higher the salt concentration the faster the cure happens. I have fully cured a 2” piece of BB in 2 days with 6% salt. So if we cut the salt to 1.6% this process slows down just a bit. In curing meats to give extra time is wise with lower salt %.

 

[Fueling Around]

I will start a new thread when this is all smoked and...

I should have called this thread TILT many posts past.
The current topic has NOTHING NOWAY NADA to do with the original questions from D Dicky and dealing with FS cure.
FS cure is a Canadian product (only) with reduced nitrite concentration (5%) thanks to their food safety regulations.

This is factual, however I’ve found that by encouraging new to curing folks to stick to the 1/4” per day plus 2 days for safety will net them a much better product because this extra time allows for flavor development. Also I’ll add that the 1/4” per day is really based on a high salt concentration, around 2.5-3%. Salt is the driver of diffusion and osmosis, the higher the salt concentration the faster the cure happens. I have fully cured a 2” piece of BB in 2 days with 6% salt. So if we cut the salt to 1.6% this process slows down just a bit. In curing meats to give extra time is wise with lower salt %.

Good points Eric I forget to add.
I cure at 1% or less total salt. Even with lowered salt it will get cured before getting funky.
I double to quadruple the cure times

 

[SmokinEdge]

I should have called this thread TILT many posts past.
The current topic has NOTHING NOWAY NADA to do with the original questions from D Dicky and dealing with FS cure.
FS cure is a Canadian product (only) with reduced nitrite concentration (5%) thanks to their food safety regulations.


Good points Eric I forget to add.
I cure at 1% or less total salt. Even with lowered salt it will get cured before getting funky.
I double to quadruple the cure times

Yup, I agree and I will add that you have a good plan. I’ve played with the salt way up and down the ladder. You are safe and doing it right.

 

[tallbm]

This is factual, however I’ve found that by encouraging new to curing folks to stick to the 1/4” per day plus 2 days for safety will net them a much better product because this extra time allows for flavor development. Also I’ll add that the 1/4” per day is really based on a high salt concentration, around 2.5-3%. Salt is the driver of diffusion and osmosis, the higher the salt concentration the faster the cure happens. I have fully cured a 2” piece of BB in 2 days with 6% salt. So if we cut the salt to 1.6% this process slows down just a bit. In curing meats to give extra time is wise with lower salt %.

Yeah I agree. The 2 days at the end will get it done for sure :D

 

[SmokinEdge]

Yeah I agree. The 2 days at the end will get it done for sure :D

On a 2” piece of meat those two days will get them to 10 days total, much better than just 5.