Meat, Bacon, Pork, Ribs, & Meat. Plus some Meat.

Fidel

fat guys have a way with bacon

kmellecker

Wow, that's some good looking bacon. We used to live on a little farm up in Virgina and we raise a few hogs for several years. We'd slaughter the day after Thanksgiving and it would take us until late Sunday night to finish, but it was worth the trouble for all that fresh pork. In those pre-Egg days, we would salt cure the bacon and it was delicious. Certainly nothing like store bought. You have me wanting to do it the Egg way now. Great job.

Humphrey Chimpden Earwicker

i found a couple recipes for pork skin. i might do some roasted cracklins, and a sicilian dish of rolled skin with parsley, pignoli, parm, etc.

thanks for the props.

Humphrey Chimpden Earwicker

that door is 6 feet high. i can't get the hummer out now

Humphrey Chimpden Earwicker

figured you were gonna give me grief for the beer. hahaha

i have one tomato left... plants look like hell. season's over....

Humphrey Chimpden Earwicker

the cure is a simple salt box cure, with some salt, sugar, and pink salts. i have a one pound batch. to it i add other sugars (in the case of sweet), or bay leaf, pepper, garlic, etc. in the case of the savory.

basically dredge the belly in the dry cure, put it in a ziploc, and then add the adjunct flavors. easy stuff.

Fidel

Funny story along those lines. My neighbor built his house on the lot next to mine. He had a third garage added off to one side of the house. They also added a fireplace in their kitchen keeping room with built-in surrounds. To keep it flush with the interior walls the entire enclosure was built out into that third garage.

When the house was done he could pull a vehicle into the garage but there wasn't clearance on either side to open a door to get it or out. Now it is basically expensive storage space for his kids' toys and bikes.

kmellecker

By "box cure" do you mean the kind you would get from the feed store and did I understand you correctly that you only left it in the cure for 24 hours? Thanks for the advice.

Humphrey Chimpden Earwicker

not cure from a prepackaged box (though you can use those), but what they used to call (i think) "salt box cure". basically, you mix up a big batch of dry cure (the salts and simple sugar), and then drop a piece of meat in it in a box and shake it all around until the thing is coated. whatever sticks is enough. you set it aside and toss another piece of meat into the box and start again.

hi-mountain cures are essentially the same thing, plus flavors added , like other sugars for different flavors. though they come in a box, that's not what i meant.

these were thin (due to my poor meat cutting skills), and so i cured them for 6 days instead of 7, turning them over each day to redistribute the cure. they firm up when cured

kmellecker

Learn something new everyday, no matter how old you get. Thanks for taking the time to enlighten me. Looking forward to some real bacon.

Mr Holloway

Great post. Really want to try this
Gotta start looking for some belly.

...and I know what you mean about those "canadians"

:laugh: :laugh: :laugh: :laugh: :laugh:

BurntRaw

Ouch! Sorry to hear about the hummer.

But with all those Carbon Credits you purchased I can't see you getting rid of it any time soon.

Will it fit? Maybe not the first time.

AZRP

Did you have trouble getting the skin off? That's the part I have problems with. -RP

eenie meenie

St!ke, I wondered where you've been lately. I just figured you were up to no good. Imagine my surprise when I see the documentation that you were actually up to some good. Quite a lot of good, actually.

I had to laugh when I saw the pic of your pork belly witht he ribs still attached. I've ordered stuff from the butcher and been surprised when I unwrapped the meat at home and realized I had to problem solve. The trimmed results look great, as do the final ccoks.

What, no fish pics? I thought you were a pro at photoshop????

Humphrey Chimpden Earwicker

that was easiest for me... still not very deft. i used a shorter fillet knife. now that i have that longer old knife with the nice curved blade i think it'll work better.

Humphrey Chimpden Earwicker

you might be able to find a small (12" x 12" chunk of belly) from a local butcher. i asked for whole bellies, and got a little more than i bargained for (spares attached).

gonna ask if i can get boneless next time. will make it much easier on me

Humphrey Chimpden Earwicker

i have one pic of "life on the boat", aside from my beer pic. i literally said "alright everybody, turn around and give me a smile", i waited about five seconds, gave up and took a pic of the back of three guys, heads.

we have a pic of one fish, on an arm held so close to the camera that it made it look like it was almost a two-pounder. hahaha

RRP

BEAUTIFUL! Thanks for sharing!

Jeffersonian

Having done bacon a few times ala Ruhlman, I'd say it's slightly more expensive than the cheapest bacon I can find at the grocery store, but much cheaper than the "specialty" bacons I find on the shelf.

That said, the taste is far, far superior than the el-cheapo bacon and rivals that of the specialty guys'. Plus you can tweak your seasonings to get what you like or want at any particular time: Sweet, savory, etc.

And yeah, there's the "wow" factor of people knowing you cure and smoke your own bacon. I'm loving the Ruhlman book.

Jeffersonian

but like all candians, he was drunk and unintelligible.

:laugh: :laugh:

You need a trip to Windsor to visit some of the more fine, male-oriented establishments.

Ripnem

Man, if you're gonna do it...DO IT! very nice, across the board.

Love the door. You should put a couple faux knobs on it. :P

Clay Q

Nice job smokin and a great job on the garret. :cheer:
It's Miller Time, love it.
Have a great weekend Stike!

Grandpas Grub

 
What a nice camp spot. Great looking food. I need to give the bacon a try.

Kent

Hoss

DAMMITBOY! IMPRESSIVE! I gotta get that book.