Pork Bellies...Quick question

jabam

I'm going to start making my own bacon, so a couple of questions for you eggsperts.

1. What percentage weight loss is there from fresh belly to cured, smoked bacon?

2. When curing do you leave skin on or remove?

Darby_Crenshaw

if you re brining you'd be adding weight there.

for dry curing (what most home cure recipes are), you might lose 10-15% i think?  i never tracked it or calculated it. a pound of bacon from the store is mostly water, so a pound of home made bacon (dry cured) is a totally different thing. not apples to apples.

i take the skin off fist.  Ruhlmann and others do it after hot smoking because it is easier, but it ain;'t hard to do to begin with.

i make cracklins of a sort (dried slow in the oven for a number of hours at 200, salted).

i also think that it helps with flavor from smoking.  contrary to the popular belief, smoke doesn't do any real penetrating of meat.  it sits on the surface.  why smoke it and then cut off one entire side of hard-won smoke flavor?

i take the skin off, cure it, then cold or hot smoke.  done.

nolaegghead

I have weighed before and after the process and you'll lose about what Stike says in weight - around 10-15% with a dry cure and hot smoke.  I believe I posted this information somewhere on the forum.  That does not include skin removal.

jabam

Thanks guys! That's all I needed to know. I'm just keeping it simple this first time, with a salt cure and hot smoke. I'll skin it first. 

J-dubya

Most butchers will remove the skin for you (and give it to you), curing bacon is awesome. 

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milesvdustin

I just made my first batch of homemade bacon. Belly was 10.21 pounds to start, ended up with 8.82 pounds of finished bacon. So basically 15% give or take. The end hunks that i didnt slice i diced up, awesome to fry up in some eggs.