Ground and formed bacon... my attempt

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daveomak

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Nov 12, 2010
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Omak,Washington,U.S.A.
The start of my 100% pork G&FB....  I used up part of a pork butt last week for Korean Pork Jerky... used all the lean meat for that...

SOOOO, I had the fatty meat and trimmed fat left over....   about 4#"s of the stuff...  must be near 50% fat....  decided to try this G&FB..

Ground it all through the small grinder plate..  Put it in the KA mixer with the paddle.... I added my commercial bacon Maple Sugar Cure to see what the difference would be when not using belly....  It's  85% salt, 0.75% nitrite and I assume the rest might be maple sugar and cure accelerator of some sort... 

At 2% addition to the meat, the salt content will be 1.7%...  the cure will be 150 Ppm nitrite and the rest, who knows.. I added about 14 oz, of water while the meat was mixing in the KA to get it to mix well, at 2 oz. per shot...  It was really dry...   I didn't want too much liquid...   The mix was really sticky...  the KA does a good job....   I tried to press the meat in the pan really well but I noticed a few air pockets...   I'll have to work on that...

It's been in the smoker for 2 hours and it ain't dry enough, on the surface yet to add smoke....   I think I screwed up leaving the meat in the refer overnight...   It was covered with waxed paper...  should have left it uncovered so it would have dried out a bit..   Next time...  if I remember...

Here it is drying in the smoker....  been trying to get the temp stabilized at 130...  been running about 110-115..   It will take a bit longer before the hickory pellets give up their love on the slab...


Well, at 5 PM the smoke ran out...   smoked at 130 ish....  Now the smoker is up to 140 ish to start the cook...    Probably5-6 more hours before a final IT of 138-140 is reached...

I will be sticking to the pasteurization table for non-intact meats, to determine when it's safe to eat...  even though I will be frying/baking it..

I always cook longer than the time table, just to be sure, in the event my therm is not calibrated perfectly..

FSIS Guidance on Safe Cooking of Non-Intact Meat Chops, Roasts, and Steaks April 2009

Temp °F / Time for 5.0 log Reduction

135.......... 28 min.

136 ..........22 min.

137 ..........18 min.

138 ..........14 min.

139.......... 11 min.

140 ...........9 min.

141........... 7 min.

This Time/Temperature table is based on Thermal Death Curve for Salmonella in Beef Emulsions in tubes (Derived from Goodfellow & Brown1, 1978) Regulatory Curve obtained from Jerry Carosella, Deputy Director, Microbiology Division, Science and Technology. All times that were a fraction of a minute or second was rounded up to the next whole number (e.g., 16.2 seconds for 155 °F was round up to 17 seconds).

________________________ 1. Goodfellow, S. J. and W. L. Brown. 1978. Fate of Salmonella Inoculated into Beef for Cooking. Journal of Food Protection. 41:598-605.

About 5 hours of hickory...  140 ish IT for1 hour...  It's in the refer on a wire rack to "mellow"....

... ...

Right now, I'm not "thrilled" with the size of the slab...  Next time I'm thinking of using bread pans and making smaller slabs...  Primarily because of the "uneven" heating in the MES 30...  Even after all the crap I've done to try and eliminate it....  Then I can easily move the small slabs around...

First taste test...   about 12 hours in the refer....  pretty good...  I find the crispy edges are the best..   I will cook this stuff longer, in the oven, to get it crisped up.....  Well, I think I'm hooked....  Takes 1 day as compared to 30 days for great belly bacon....  About 1/2 the price...   and with some experimenting, I CAN change the flavor profile.....

...

Thanks to everyone that started this G&FB stuff..  WELL WORTH IT !!!

Dave

I just put some of my home made maple syrup on it.....   WOW !!!  does that ring my bell....
 
Looks tasty Dave!

Point.

When I've made formed jerky I place the blob of meat in the middle of the pan and then roll it from the center out to the edges with a 22 oz beer bottle (SWMBO won't let me use her rolling pin). This method won't leave air pockets in the meat.
 
Very nice.   I love mine that I made, bout ready for more.

What sized pan did you use?   I used 11x11 or something like that.

I also covered mine then overnight in the fridge, it took awhile in the smoker to dry out.
 
 
Very nice.   I love mine that I made, bout ready for more.

What sized pan did you use?   I used 11x11 or something like that.

I also covered mine then overnight in the fridge, it took awhile in the smoker to dry out.
The pan is a 9X12 or so..    I'm thinking a 9X5 bread pan would work better in my smoker..   then heat could pass through between the slabs ...    At one point, the big slab was  138 on one end and 127 on the other...    When you are trying to "pasteurize" a hunk of meat, so you don't overcook it, that difference is no good...  I will be able to check individual hunks and pull them when they are ready and let the others cook...
 
It sure looks good Dave!

And I have to give you a point for a very detailed post.

But I think I'll just stick to my belly bacon!

I love that crispy, chewy texture that you get with belly bacon.

Al
 
 
It sure looks good Dave!

And I have to give you a point for a very detailed post.

But I think I'll just stick to my belly bacon!

I love that crispy, chewy texture that you get with belly bacon.

Al
I agree A, I've got 2 bellies in the freezer now....    Just a test in the event I run out...   30 days is too long to wait for great bacon.. and I refuse to buy store bought at $6 a pound...
 
Good lookin GFB.......Dave
Thanks Rick.....    It taste pretty good too....
 
 
It looks good Rick, but tell me that all that grease isn't dripping on the counter top!

Al
My wife would kill me for that.  

wife.gif


Has a tray that slides into a track under the grill.

 
 
Dave the ground and formed bacon looks delicious!      Was the cure Mortons Sugar Cure?
Afternoon whistech.....   Nope on the Morton's...    Too much salt per amount of nitrite for this old dog....  It's a commercial cure I use.....  I got it from my meat guy.... 

85% salt....  0.75% nitrite + sugars etc...  they don't say....    use 2% per weight of the meat...  7 days per inch of thickness in the refer at 38 deg. F....  I cure 14 days...  

I like the fact when using it, the salt content in the bacon is 1.7%....   I'm cutting back on salt...

Similar pre mixed cures can be purchased from different suppliers...   If they say "make a brine" you can use them as a rub...   you need to know the amounts of stuff they use in the product...   AND you can still add stuff to the bacon....

Morton's TQ or Sugar Cure have 0.5% nitrite + 0.5% nitrate and 99% salt + sugar + glycol...

 
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