First timer, when is it ready?

[fsa317]

Hi all,  trying my first batch of home cured bacon.  I've had 3 pieces of belly in ziploc bags in the fridge curing since Wednesday night.  They are firming up but not totally firm.   I'm leaving for camping on Thursday and would love to be able to smoke it Wednesday and bring w/ me Thursday.  

Questions:

1) How can I tell if its ready on Wednesday?  

2) Anything I can do to speed things up?

Thanks.

 

[SmokinAl]

Most of us go 2 weeks in the cure.

Al

 

[chef jimmyj]

There is no good way to tell it's done. Only way to speed the cure is Brine Injection. Sounds like you are using a Dry Cure so Injecting is not really an option. A week per inch is recommended. Most add a couple days for insurance that the cure is all the to the center. If you pull early, there is no safety issue but the very center will be Gray when cooked and taste a little bland. Let it go 2 week for best result...JJ

 

[tallbm]

Hi there and welcome!

I've used LEM's bacon seasonings and they basically say go 7 days, I go 8 for safe measure.

I believe there is some good info out there about how many days to use with dry cure per inch of thickness as JJ is alluding to. 

To my knowledge firmness is no indicator of readiness for bacon being completely cured.  Only the use of the proper amount of cure and time would be your measure.

I doubt you will be able to have it fully cured AND smoked by the time you go on your camping trip Thu.

I don't know what your smoking process will be, what Internal Temp (IT) you will be taking the bacon if any at all, and how you plan to slice it.

In general you will need 7-8 days of dry cure.  I smoke to an IT of 145F which has taken 12 hours before and gone as fast as 3.5 hours with my new setup.  It is not good to just crank up the heat on bacon to try and make it go faster because the fat will render and drain out which is bad.

You would walk up to a temp of about 165F max or so.

Also, I prefer 5 hours of smoke on my hot smoked bacon, that is perfect for me.  So in my case 1 hour to dry and 5 hours cooking and applying smoke to make a total 6 hour cook. 

I then rest the bacon in the fridge overnight or so for smoke flavor to meld into it and then slice.

That is a tough timeline to follow from Wed - Thu while also getting ready for a camping trip.

Again I'm not sure what your approach would be but mine is fairly quick and covers all the basis of a hot bacon smoke.

Best of luck with it all and I hope it somehow works out :)

 

[jokensmoken]

Maybe it isn't realistic for you but, I'd throw it in a cooler, take it with me and smoke it at camp...what could be better than the smell of fresh smoking bacon out in the woods?