Messed up my bacon?

[durangodoug]

Just did my first batch of bacon. 60 lbs of it. (I like to make big mistakes) I think I may have messed up.

Some of it is black, which I assume is not edible. (See pics) I'm all ears for recommendations at this point, as well as where I may have gone wrong. I'm currently inclined to just cut out the black stuff and see if it starts to smell after a week in the fridge.

The crime scene:
This is all meat that was butchered by my sister-in-law. She raises pigs. A fair amount of it was freezer burnt in ziplocs, and I question if she knew what she was doing during the butcher process. It's possible I was screwed from the start... I did my best to remove anything that didn't look great, but honestly I've seen worse meat.

Regardless of the less than perfect meat quality, I'm not sure I did everything right. I dry cured in gallon bags by weight: 3% salt, 1.25% brown sugar, .25% #1 cure. 16 day cure @ 38 degrees. 12 hour smoke ranging 75-120 degree grate temp.

There are two mistakes I feel I may have made:

1) I had multiple pieces of meat in each bag, and some of the pieces of belly were folded in half. I thought I did a good job of distributing the cure, and i flipped and massaged bags about every other day. The biggest patch of black is where a belly was folded in half. I feel I should have had one piece of meat per bag, and if a belly didn't fit I should have cut it in half into two separate bags instead of folding it in half in one bag.

2) It was all frozen when I got it. I defrosted it for 2 weeks at 34 degrees before I started the cure. I should have started the cure after 1 week of defrosting. I don't think this was the problem, but maybe.

Roast me....

 

[Fueling Around]

I have never seen the black as that.
I always cut belly down not so much to fit a zip bag, but so it fits my meat slicer.

Giving a bump so others can post comments.

 

[chopsaw]

My guess , and it's just a guess , would be extreme freezer burn . Like severe frostbite turns black . Even if it wasn't black after defrosting , it turns fast after the air hits it .
Almost looks dry aged like maybe the bags were getting air in the freezer .

 

[normanaj]

If someone just showed me the pics and nothing else my first thought would be severely freezer burnt.

 

[SmokinEdge]

I would personally like to see a profile cut shot right through the black area.

 

[SmokinEdge]

It’s possibly a lot of things, but it could maybe also be a bruise. Meat can and will bruise during slaughter.

 

[durangodoug]

Here's a profile shot of the worst of it. Notably, this does not smell rotten at all. It could be freezer burn, but this patch of black was on the inside of a large slab folded in half. Pretty sure it wasn't burned. While applying cure, I did unfold to apply cure and then folded it back in half to stuff in the bag.

Regardless of the cause and what it is, my plan is to trim off anything that doesn't look good, and then smoke it again. Unless I'm advised otherwise.

 

[SmokinEdge]

Here's a profile shot of the worst of it. Notably, this does not smell rotten at all. It could be freezer burn, but this patch of black was on the inside of a large slab folded in half. Pretty sure it wasn't burned. While applying cure, I did unfold to apply cure and then folded it back in half to stuff in the bag.

Regardless of the cause and what it is, my plan is to trim off anything that doesn't look good, and then smoke it again. Unless I'm advised otherwise.

That’s what I would do too. Make sure to post a picture after smoking.

 

[Winterrider]

If that's where the fold was, that is probably where more air was and caused extra freezer burn.

 

[SmokinEdge]

Curious, what type of salt did you use? Course Kosher style, or granulated? Iodized? Or no?

 

[durangodoug]

Curious, what type of salt did you use? Course Kosher style, or granulated? Iodized? Or no?

Kosher

 

[SmokinEdge]

Kosher

With that in mind, my suspicion is that the black areas are likely nitrite burn. This usually is more greenish in color but can become dark. If this is the case it would be the result of the dry cure mix classifying away from the salt because of the granulated size of cure #1 vs. flak ish size of kosher salt. I’ve used it a bunch with success but find it much better and easier to use clean granulated salt such as pickling/canning, sea salt or just plain granulated table salt that is non-iodized.

The nitrite burn can happen when too much concentration of nitrite is in a spot on meat. It’s not really that common especially when using .25% of cure 1 to meat weight, but it can happen. Especially when combined with kosher salt. You really should have had enough sugar though to keep the nitrite spread evenly, so it is a head scratcher for sure.

I don’t believe that freezer burn can in fact turn meat black. I’ve never seen it and anyone who has can’t post a picture of it and I will stand corrected.

 

[durangodoug]

With that in mind, my suspicion is that the black areas are likely nitrite burn. This usually is more greenish in color but can become dark. If this is the case it would be the result of the dry cure mix classifying away from the salt because of the granulated size of cure #1 vs. flak ish size of kosher salt. I’ve used it a bunch with success but find it much better and easier to use clean granulated salt such as pickling/canning, sea salt or just plain granulated table salt that is non-iodized.

The nitrite burn can happen when too much concentration of nitrite is in a spot on meat. It’s not really that common especially when using .25% of cure 1 to meat weight, but it can happen. Especially when combined with kosher salt. You really should have had enough sugar though to keep the nitrite spread evenly, so it is a head scratcher for sure.

I don’t believe that freezer burn can in fact turn meat black. I’ve never seen it and anyone who has can’t post a picture of it and I will stand corrected.

That's interesting. I could see this being what happened. I did notice that it's hard to get the cure and kosher to mix evenly. It also bet it's more likely to happen on this spot of meat where the cure was trapped inside the folded piece of belly.

 

[SmokinEdge]

It also bet it's more likely to happen on this spot of meat where the cure was trapped inside the folded piece of belly.

Kind of so, but then you would expect it to mirror on the opposite fold, which it did not.

The only other thing I have personally seen that turns cure meat that dark grey/black color is rust from steel (not stainless) wire racks. But the spots are small but still look same. In that case it’s just iron oxide. Unless the meat was exposed to bare iron or steel that can’t be the case.

 

[Fueling Around]

That's interesting. I could see this being what happened. I did notice that it's hard to get the cure and kosher to mix evenly. It also bet it's more likely to happen on this spot of meat where the cure was trapped inside the folded piece of belly.

I put all my sugars, salt, and, cure through a blade style coffee grinder to get a uniform powder to apply a dry rub.

 

[SmokinEdge]

I put all my sugars, salt, and, cure through a blade style coffee grinder to get a uniform powder to apply a dry rub.

This may not be totally necessary, but is still a very smart move.