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Made Bacon - 1st time

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    Made Bacon - 1st time

    This will take several posts, so give me a few to get all posted.
    For those that didn't see my prelude: https://discussions.texasbowhunter.c...d.php?t=798887

    I've watched a good number of folks here do bacon, so I thought I'd give it a go.

    1st thing I discovered is pork bellies are more difficult to find in the city than out. I picked up 11# from La Michoacana that came to ~8.5# after skin removed. That came to about $5.50/lb. Then also picked up another 5.5# with the skin already removed from Central Market at $5.50 /lb. The belly from Central Market looked a lot thicker and just looked better than the belly from La Michoacana. 1st pick one from La Michoacana & 2nd pic is one of three we got at Central Market.
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    #2
    I tried 3 diffferent rubs for the bacon. A Honey cured recipe from Rytek, a maple/brown sugar rub, and a maple black pepper rub. As I was planning on cold smoking the bacon (and I did read a lot on the internet of folks that discouraged cold smoking in favor of hot smoking) I weighed the meat and the curing salt (Instacure/Prague powder #1).
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      #3
      After the rubs, all of the bellies sat in the beer fridge for 9 days. The storm did catch me. I had my offset smoker rigged to try a cold smoke and the cold weather helped some.

      Bellies soaked in water for an hour. Then sat in the fridge overnight (12 hours or so) on wire racks. I should've cooked some of each, but didn't. Thought the hour would be enough. I did the La Michoacana 1st.
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        #4
        I had the pellet tube smokers with hickory to use for the smoke source. Given that it was well below freezing I fired up the smoker with a small fire to get it above freezing. That was likely not needed. And as I had oak for the firebox, those had an off flavor. As the temperature approached 80 I stopped the fire box smoke.
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          #5
          The 2nd batch on the smoker (I only invested in 2 10 prong bacon hangers) was colder outside, did not use the fire box at all and the meat never froze and temperature never got near 80.
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            #6
            I got to try out my new slicer. Lesson I learned after the 1st one was to put the bacon in the freezer a few hours to really firm up. And don't cut too thick.
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              #7
              So the 1st slab with the honey cure, was a thick cut on the slicer and tasted (and cooked) more like ham than bacon. This was also half the belly I picked up from La Michoacana. It was the 1st in the smoker and exposed to the oak in addition to hickory. It smoked 10 hours. It was a bit too salty and bit too much smoke. It is dedicated to a future batch of venison-bacon burgers which I’m sure will be every bit as good as the other batches.

              The 2nd slab which was also from La Michoacana belly had the same smoke but was the maple/brown sugar cure. I had it in the freezer for 3-4 hours. It cut much better and tasted much better. Maybe still a bit too much smoke.

              Next day the Central Market bellies went to smoker. No oak in fire box as I had determined that the tube smokers would keep the temperature above freezing (it was 6 degrees outside). This was the best batch. I also cut the smoke down to 5 hours.
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                #8
                And seeming how I was already in the smoking mood I tried to smoke some cheese. The white cheddar smoked for ~2 hours while the yellow cheddar smoked for almost 5. They were both good. I favor the white though and plan it with some summer sausage.
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                  #9
                  Dang. Looks good. Now im hungry.

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                    #10
                    So, I still have the bacon bug. While we were at Central Market stocking up for the big freeze, we bought the last 3 pork bellies they had. New rub of just brown sugar & black pepper. This has been in fridge since Sunday 2/14. I think it looks better that the others at this stage...
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                      #11
                      Will likely soak and dry on Wednesday and Smoke on Thursday (paying a little attention to outside temperatures).

                      And that's my story. A new hobby is formed….

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                        #12
                        Do you think part of the reason the CM pork belly made better bacon had to do with the quality of the meat? If so, what was the difference in price-per-pound?

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                          #13
                          Originally posted by ThisLadyHunts View Post
                          Do you think part of the reason the CM pork belly made better bacon had to do with the quality of the meat? If so, what was the difference in price-per-pound?
                          I do think the CM belly was higher quality. It was thicker and had more meat. It had already been trimmed of skin. It was also smaller pieces. The La Michoacana was the whole belly. I was impressed by the La Michoacana meat market. So I don't want to sound anti La Michoacana. In this case the CM just seemed better. But it is CM. After skin removal, they La Michoacana out to be just as expensive as CM. Both came in at $5.50/lb. The La Michoacana was $4.29/lb with the skin. After you remove the skin it was $5.49.

                          I had a good amount of feedback that costco and Berkshires has cheaper. And I know HEB does. But there weren't any near me that had bellies. HEB is a 45 minute drive.

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                            #14
                            I've been toying with this for a while now. Looking good on your end.

                            I've bought the HEB trimmed pork bellies to smoke for snacks during BBQ cooks. They're great and ready to cook.

                            I've read a little about it and it seems most hot smoke.

                            Any idea why most prefer hot smoke?

                            Sent from my SM-N975U using Tapatalk

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                              #15
                              Once you eat bacon that is cold smoked at home, you will wonder what the heck the stores have been passing off to us and calling it bacon.

                              My SIL cold smoked some a few years back, it was my first taste of bacon made that way......oh my my my.

                              Looks so good.

                              Sent from my moto z3 using Tapatalk

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