Batch of Canadian bacon

[griz400]

11/26/17 - noon - start date

Starting off with pops wet brine ...
1 gallon water

1/3 - 1 cup sea salt (depending if you're on a lo-salt diet)
used 3/4 cup

1 cup granulated sugar or Splenda®
used 1 cup granulated sugar

1 cup brown sugar or Splenda® brown sugar mix
used 1 cup

1 humping tbsp cure no. 1 pink salt

Also added 1 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1 1/2 teaspoon of onion powder
1 teaspoon of dried sage

now, took 3 nice 7 1/2 lb loins, cut into 8 inch pieces after trimming all fat off, gives me 6 - 8 inch pieces, so will be 4 ft of bacon ...

and had 2 loin pieces leftover and a 1 lb bag of nice pieces I marked as beans for the freezer
double stacked in my container and the batch covered it all nicely, weighed down with some frozen water bottles,set fridge at 38 degrees this am ... and now, will brine 12 - 14 days ...

trimmed all 3 like this and have a couple of small loins for the smoker ...

double stacked and ready for the fridge

brine on and in the fridge

 

[tropics]

I have a good seat
Richie

 

[griz400]

One thing I wonder is , Is this enough ( strong enough) to cure all this loin ?? It is approx 15 lbs of loin ... I mixed up just 1 batch of brine and it covered it all nicely .... In the past when I have done it, It's usually just like 2 - 8 inch pieces ..

 

[tropics]

Jeff you did not say how much water you used,the only thing I see that doesn't look good.The meat touching is preventing it from absorbing the cure at them spots.You can make another batch of cure and use the big zip locks,to give better coverage ensuring you have enough cure for that amount of meat

Richie

 

[griz400]

Just the 1 gallon of water -- I edited now --I figured it will be ok ... I might move them around every few days or so

 

[tropics]

Yes the will work if you can let them stay longer it wouldn't hurt
Richie

 

[daveomak]

The FDA accepted rate for cure #1 is 1 tsp. per 5#'s of stuff... 15#'s of loin + ~10#'s of brine/cure.. = 25#'s of stuff..
Sooo, you should have 5 tsp. of cure #1 mixed in... 1 TBS. = 3 tsp. ....

 

[griz400]

so, It wouldn't hurt to mix in like 2 more teaspoons of #1 in a warm cup of water to dissolve it good ??? will do after work and mix it all up ... I just didn't figure it would matter cause the mixture covered it all, and should soak in no matter how much meat is in container .. but, I guess , a little stronger mix would be best ...

 

[daveomak]

so, It wouldn't hurt to mix in like 2 more teaspoons of #1 in a warm cup of water to dissolve it good ??? will do after work and mix it all up ... I just didn't figure it would matter cause the mixture covered it all, and should soak in no matter how much meat is in container .. but, I guess , a little stronger mix would be best ...

I would add 2 tsp. of cure #1.... Don't use warm water... Nitrite starts to break down at 130 deg. F.... Dissolve in cool to cold water...

 

[griz400]

I actually went back this evening and added about 1 humping teaspoon to it all, mixed thorough to mixture cause it was just a level tablespoon that I used previously .. had a little hump, but not much ...

 

[Rings Я Us]

Should be cool..
Just saw this post. Your a couple days ahead of me.. Was going to do a couple Canadian bacon chunks myself.. My mom likes that alot.

Had to do the popcorn thing, couldn't resist! Lol

 

[GaryHibbert]

That's a lot of bacon coming your way Jeff!!
I'm in.
Gary

 

[pops6927]

As long as the meat(s) are covered in curing brine (weighted down to totally immerse), the amount of curing brine does not matter; whether it is 1 gallon or 100 gallons, they will cure properly as long as it is the same concentration of curing brine. see this post: http://www.smokingmeatforums.com/t/...bacon-and-red-spots-on-cured-meat#post_771341
Same way with the two 20 lb. turkeys I just put down - they were tight together and there was no more than an inch or two of curing brine surrounding them, plus plates on the top to make sure they were submerged, which pushed them right tight to the bottom:

and they will cure just fine! We used to stack 350 lbs. of bellies in a 55 gallon drum, one right on top of another, balancing them so the bucket wouldn't tip, fill with curing brine and weigh them down with a 5 gal. jug of water to prevent them from floating. They cured just fine, did it for many, many years.


http://smokingmeatforums.com/index.php?threads/curing-with-pops-brine.270282/#post-1772101

You don't need to heat it, you don't need to boil it, only stir until dissolved. The cure is totally dissolvable; once dissolved, it cannot be un-dissolved. Once dissolved, the ingredients do not need to be re-stirred; they have been dissolved initially and completely. I have done this thousands upon thousands of times, from one gallon to 55 gallon batches, a dozen times over. Don't make it more difficult than it has to be. Add ingredients, add water, stir a couple dozen times, pour in and just plain let it sit and do it's magic! So Simple!

This is where I copied it from: http://smokingmeatforums.com/index.php?threads/christmas-party-2017.270280/#post-1772010

 

[griz400]

I wanna thank you pops ... for alot of clarification ... glad you joined in with your knowledge of curing meats is impeccable for sure .. this is the biggest batch I have made ,, around 15 lbs .. going to cold smoke a couple hrs on my reverse flow smoker with some real hickory and some charcoal and then keep warming it up with more and more heat and hickory to an internal of 145 to 150 .. will first fire up smoker with about a half a can of charcoal and add some hickory, then keep adding charcoal and hickory along the way ...thanks again for posting up on my bacon thread ... Jeff

 

[griz400]

will be a nice morning tomorrow to smoke up the bacon ... supposed to be 43-44 degrees in the am .. perfect ......it's been curing for 13 days in pops brine and around noon I will take out and give it an ice water bath for a few hours, then will pat dry and air dry in fridge till early morning and smoke it on the reverse flow ...

 

[GaryHibbert]

Don't forget to do a fry test--just to make sure.
Gary

 

[Rings Я Us]

will be a nice morning tomorrow to smoke up the bacon ... supposed to be 43-44 degrees in the am .. perfect ......it's been curing for 13 days in pops brine and around noon I will take out and give it an ice water bath for a few hours, then will pat dry and air dry in fridge till early morning and smoke it on the reverse flow ...

What do you figure to start at? Like 130 ish and bump it up every couple hours for like 8 to 12 hours?

 

[daveomak]

When adding smoke to any meat, you want it warmer than the ambient temperature, so condensate does not form on it... Condensate and smoke makes for a nasty taste... "acid rain" is what I call it....

 

[Bearcarver]

will be a nice morning tomorrow to smoke up the bacon ... supposed to be 43-44 degrees in the am .. perfect ......it's been curing for 13 days in pops brine and around noon I will take out and give it an ice water bath for a few hours, then will pat dry and air dry in fridge till early morning and smoke it on the reverse flow ...

Or you could come up here to smoke it, but you better bring a shovel---It's getting awful White out here!!! :rolleyes:

Bear

 

[griz400]

What I have in mind is like a half a can of kingsford and some hickory chips .. to start, get a little heat going in the reverse flow ... around 100 or so, for a few hours, then bring up temp and get about a 150 internal ... this will probably take anther 3 hrs or so .. I dont want to oversmoke it ....