My 1st cure begins

[Whisky Fish]

Doing half wet, half dry cure. The wet cure is a packaged brine mix from The Sausage Maker and the dry is a simple 50/50 Kosher to Brown Sugar with
.4 oz instacure.
Dry is Vac Packed.
According to the lable I'll be able to pull the Bacon from the wet in 5 days. we'll see how that goes.

cure 001.jpg

cure 002.jpg

cure 004.jpg

Wish me luck

JT

[Fishawn]

Good luck JT... Looking good so far!

[lcruzen]

The waiting is tough but worth it. I'll be watching your progress.

[cjinvancouver]

I'll be there in about 2 weeks from today. Be sure to save some! CJ

[Zeeker]

Keep us posted Whisky Fish. All the best...

[Whisky Fish]

I'll be there in about 2 weeks from today. Be sure to save some! CJ

Be careful what you ask for.lol did you miss the title? , , My 1st cure?.
Besides the dry cure takes longer. You may have to help me smoke it(aka bring beer).

And Thanks Scott and Icruzen, you're invited too. We can always use more beer! lol

[Whisky Fish]

Zeeker Too!

[Whisky Fish]

Went longer on the wet cure(pickle) than the lable said. Said five days and I went 7 because my cooler was too cold. It was either 41/42 degrees average or 35. so I opted for the cooler temp. I'm thinkin I did okay because the fry tests were really salty but everything was really hammy(good) and the color was right on. I had to soak for 1.5 hrs on the bellies and 2 for the CB to ease up on the salt. Gonna smoke tomorrow. K so low on the bellies untill 125 and ramp up on the CB till 140-160? got some apple wood and I'm thinkin on using that. comments please.

JT

[Bbqgoddess]

Not sure how I missed the begining of this but I am glad I jumped in the middle!
Sounds like your right on the money, I can't wait to see the money shots tomorrow!!! Happy bacon makin' Whisky Fish!

[curious aardvark]

Besides the dry cure takes longer.

only if you are injecting the brine - otherwise it's the same length of time.
About 5 minutes after rubing the bacon it's drawn sufficient water from the meat to be mostly liquid. And you don't need to vac pack - a ziplock bag is fine :-)

I generally give everything a week - belly pork is pretty thin so 5-7 days is plenty of time for a dry cure. Plus loins have almost no fat so the cure penetrates faster than for shoulders.
you shouuld find it less salty than the brine, commercial brines and cures tend to have more salt in than you might want.

Any way you loook at it though it's going to be much better than anything you get from the shops :-)

I smoked my cb to 150. next time I think I'll stop at 145. It's firm and quite moist, but a little less firm wouldn't have hurt :-)

Look forward to seeing your smoked pics :-)
And prepare to be hooked lol

[Whisky Fish]

I think I'll take your advice CA and pull the dry cure too. Unfortunately my loin muscles seperated so each chunk turned into two. But much less thickness on them, so faster cure right. Anyways if I don't smoke the whole lot today I'll have to wait till next weekend to smoke the second batch. Thanks

JT

[wutang]

Looking forward to some more pics when you get it smoking.

[Richtee]

Unfortunately my loin muscles seperated so each chunk turned into two.

Did you buy TENDERLOINS? Those typically come packaged with 2, being about half the diameter of the LOIN cut.

[sweet_magnolia]

Good luck! Looking forward to your results!

[Whisky Fish]

Did you buy TENDERLOINS? Those typically come packaged with 2, being about half the diameter of the LOIN cut.

Yeah Rich I guess I did. I was supposed to buy a loin huh? Well thats why I'm here. Oh and you are right on about the Dry vs. Wet cure. I won't be brining again. Just the color difference is amazing. The brined pork has a much grayer appearance, while the dry is much brighter and fresher looking.

Thanks again
JT