Container for curing bacon question

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cole5000

Smoke Blower
Original poster
Mar 23, 2013
87
11
Saskatoon saskatchewan
I'm doing 10lbs of bacon with a wet cure. I have a orange 5 gallon pail that's from Home Depot. Is that good enough to use as a container? Or will it react with the meat in anyway? Thanks for any help
 
A food grade 5 gal bucket can be used not sure if the orange ones from HD are food grade tho
 
Thanks Dave I did a little more digging and found that it was food safe too. I got busy and forgot to reply on here. Thanks for all the help. The bacon is brining as we speak then next Sunday it's smoking time!
 
 
HDPE2 does not automatically mean food safe.  Usually the dyed buckets are not food safe despite being HDPE2.

Homebrewers use buckets but do not use the dyed buckets because they generally are not food safe.

Read the "product overview" on the Home Depot website for the Homer bucket and it declares it not food safe.

http://www.homedepot.com/p/The-Home-Depot-5-gal-Homer-Bucket-05GLHD2/100087613
They must not be Polyethylene, or Home Depot is just covering its ass.

HDPE is High Density Polyethylene, to my knowledge all Poly medium and low included is Food safe, although you must pay extra to get the NSF stamp imprinted. I know of no distinqtions  as to the UV inhibitors used in the pipes color. Most are of course carbon black, but there is also iron oxide (Muni gas distribution) and some very few specials like cobalt blue (For special customers water spec's, but didn't last long), but unless I am mistaken.......... they slid in as food safe

Some nylons & vinyls used in extrusion is different.... If its Polyethylene its safe. Look for the Triangle like Dave showed to insure safety.

Me, 25 years selling Phillips/Chevron polyethylene resins but mostly pipes.

BTW the color is a reflextion of the UV inhibitors, you know how an old milk jug left out in the sun will embrittle and chatter, thats low density polyethyene with out any UV inhibitors. The color blocks those sun rays. Thee was even at one time a pipe manufacturer called co-exx, it co-extruded a clear inner with a sheathed carbon black outer, thereby saving cost of carbon black. The only problem at that point was when joining the pipe you had a virgin material exposed, a future fail site.
 
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If you have a Firehouse Subs near you, they sell their empty pickle buckets for like $2 each. Proceeds go to buy equipment for local fire depts.
 
I get pails from the bakery at the supermarket for 1 dollar, the ones that had cake icing in them

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