Cold Smokin' some ribs!

[Bearcarver]

Now, i'm not sure if anyone picked up on my "process"
but i believe that i should be in the safe zone.

i'll be curing for 2 weeks... maybe a bit longer, until the osmosis process goes all the way to the bone, i'll be curing with Morton's Kosher Salt, coarse.

then i'll wash them off with cold water & put them in a boiling pot of water and cook them until they are about 1/2 way done

then i will cold smoke them for about 6-8 hours.... on a cold day so that the temps stay in the low 70's maybe high 60's... it doesnt ever get much colder than that here in Bakersfield....

then i will bbq them :D

I wouldn't try to cure meat with Kosher Salt, unless I add TQ or Cure #1.

Boiling until "Half way done" wouldn't make it safe to cold smoke for 6-8 hours, unless you kept the Cold-smoking temp below 40*.


Bear

[dba1954]

I've done this with a pork chop roast with the bone. A 10 lb er will brine in 5-7 days (ie pink all the way through). this is not cooked ! I use canning salt and a small amount of #2 pink salt (#2 Prague). Usually put some juniper berries in the brine. When it is done I soak in plain water for a few hours. At that point you can slice and fry it or hot smoke them. You could do it with ribs but pork chops or a pork loin roast would be much better in my viewpoint. Pork loin roast is like Canadian bacon ...

[Mark R]

At the least use sea salt, it has "traces" of nitrate like the salt of old. I am clear on your method. It's the 6 hours of cold smoke that concerns me (and others). It was done this way in days of old, yes. But sometimes folks got sick or worse, that is why much safer methods have been developed. C. Bot. (botulism) is nothing to play with, it will kill you.

[chisoxjim]

Can anyone suggest a curing process for the pork ribs?

buy some of those enhanced ribs I read about folks using on here, they should have a great salt cure.

[Mark R]

buy some of those enhanced ribs I read about folks using on here, they should have a great salt cure.

Now Jim!

[curious aardvark]

Saltpeter is no longer accepted as a safe curing salt. In addition, most of the "uncured" sausages, bacon, and hot dogs on the market use "celery extract" which is a high in "naturally" occurring nitrate.

Be very careful of the path you are taking. For the most part, it is NOT generally recognized as SAFE.

actually saltpetre - POTASSIUM nitrate is considered to be completely safe even in large quantities. It's considered to be non-toxic by the usda.
By contrast 4 grams of SODIUM nitrate will kill you stone cold dead.
Don't get them mixed up !

However you only need tiny trace amounts to cure meats.
Now if you are scared stiff of curing - do not EVER smoke anything, ever.
Do not ever eat salami, ham, bacon, corned beef, pastrami, spam - etc etc
These are ALL nitrate/nitrite preserved/cured products. Pretty much all lunch meats are.

ALL smoked meat is cured by the nitrous oxide in the smoke. the smoke ring is simply cured meat. Same process, same result, you just skip the bit where the nitrate is converted to nitrous in the meat tissue.

You will be sticking to sodium chloride AND iodine with table salt. Use Kosher or canning. And DO NOT think it "cured"- EG get it to 140 within 4 hours.

The down side of nitrate/ite is not measurable against it's upside.

Also give up celery, spinach, kale, radishes... just saying.

Don't let the tail wag the dog. Look beyond the sensationalistic BS into the science. Get smart...not snowed

Now, i'm not sure if anyone picked up on my "process"
but i believe that i should be in the safe zone.

i'll be curing for 2 weeks... maybe a bit longer, until the osmosis process goes all the way to the bone, i'll be curing with Morton's Kosher Salt, coarse.

then i'll wash them off with cold water & put them in a boiling pot of water and cook them until they are about 1/2 way done

then i will cold smoke them for about 6-8 hours.... on a cold day so that the temps stay in the low 70's maybe high 60's... it doesnt ever get much colder than that here in Bakersfield....

then i will bbq them :D

why go through all that when you can simply add alittle cure #1 or #2 to a marinade, marinade the ribs for 24 hours and cold smoke to your heart's content.
The boiling in particular will do the ribs no good at all. Boiling actually dries meat out - it causes the muscle fibres and proteins to contract which squeezes the water out of the cellular structure of the meat.
It also removes a lot of the fat, which is both meltes and squeezed out - the the resulting ribs taste like crap and are always dry.

Now if you want to be scared of food additives - be sensible and be scared of the stuff the bastards do not declare.
The commercial food industry is currently striving very hard towards what are called 'CLEAN LABEL' products.
This does not mean they only use the ingredients on the label - oh hell no, it means they use a bunch of stuff that they do not legally have to declare. A lot of these are new ingredients made from modified proteins, starches and fats.
NOBODY knows what the long term effects of all these new products will be on the human metabolism. But they are so called 'natural' products so do not have to be declared, which means you can shove as much crap as you like into your processed foods and only put on the labels stuff that looks safe and pleasant to eat.

I know this because I get a couple of commercial food industry magazines. And there are full of all this new crap you can use in foods without telling anyone.

Compare that to nitrate and nitrite cured meats that have been studied both as science and art for thousands of years. and there's no contest.
Corrrectly cured foods are perfectly safe to eat. commercially processed foods are considerably more dubious.

And as rich says - even people who eat a lot of bacon consume far more nitrates from vegetables.
Celery is the worst offender.

So as the curing process relies on nitrites you cannot 'cure' anything with refined salt.
You can reduce the active water content, and that's pretty much it. But you are not actively killing bacteria like nitrite does.
You are also going to end up with something that's just going to taste like licking a salt block.

The beauty of commercial curing salts like cure 1 & 2 is that the actual salt content is very low. so you can cure meat wthout making it salty.

In short - unless you become a vegan who only ever eats raw fruit - you are consuming nitrites and nitrates on a daily basis. There is no way round it.

It's not an issue :-)

And to return to the subject I cure ribs all the time. it does not taste like bacon on a stick - that require lots of salt as well as cure.
I do it because it adds a nice colour and gives you that sweetish cured meat flavour (unless you cure yourself you'll not have ever eaten anything with a low enough salt content to really notice).
You know the most dangerous thing you can do with a bbq - burn the meat. the burnt crust contains lots of nasty carcinogens.
Cured meat does not.

One thing you will find round here - we go by the chemical and scientific processes - not by what some bloke i met: 'down the pub, on a forum, in a bar, on the bus, in a taxi, or at work - tells us.

Hearsay is all well and good - but actual factual knowlege is much better

So to sum up:
1) curing meat is fine and better for you than just using massive amounts of refined salt. salt raises your blood pressure, non-salty cured meat does not.
2) All smoked food is partially cured - fact.
3) you can not avoid nitrates and nitrites so why not make an effort to control what you do eat, by curing your own food.
4) cured ribs are great, easy to do and do not need to be over salty.

5) boiling meat dries it out, reduces the fat content and flavour and quite frankly should only be used for large joints of meat where the surface area to volume ratio reduces the amount of water and fat that is lost.

Nobody is getting at you personally - but round here we take safety seriously and understand the chemistry behind what we do.
The best and quickest way to annoy people is to ignore fact based advice and listen to some bloke you met down the pub/on the internet instead :-)

[Richtee]

actually saltpetre - POTASSIUM nitrate is considered to be completely safe even in large quantities. It's considered to be non-toxic by the usda.
By contrast 4 grams of SODIUM nitrate will kill you stone cold dead.
Don't get them mixed up !

Potassium N's lethal dose in rabbits is 1.9g/Kg body weight. No human figures.
Sodium N's LD has been 321 Mg/Kg body weight.

[crusty ol salt]

Hey Fellas I'm really excited about my smoker, been smoking some pork loins & beef jerky.. also some cheese.. that stuff came out crazy good!

Now i'd like to cold smoke some pork ribs.

Can anyone suggest a curing process for the pork ribs?

or would i just do it the same as i did for the loins?

ie, salt & condiments for a week in the fridge?

WoW, thanks for starting a great thread. i have read and re-read it myself to continue my education. thanks for getting the ball rolling

Hearsay is all well and good - but actual factual knowlege is much better

So to sum up:
1) curing meat is fine and better for you than just using massive amounts of refined salt. salt raises your blood pressure, non-salty cured meat does not.
2) All smoked food is partially cured - fact.
3) you can not avoid nitrates and nitrites so why not make an effort to control what you do eat, by curing your own food.
4) cured ribs are great, easy to do and do not need to be over salty.

5) boiling meat dries it out, reduces the fat content and flavour and quite frankly should only be used for large joints of meat where the surface area to volume ratio reduces the amount of water and fat that is lost.

Nobody is getting at you personally - but round here we take safety seriously and understand the chemistry behind what we do.
The best and quickest way to annoy people is to ignore fact based advice and listen to some bloke you met down the pub/on the internet instead :-)

CA, that was a great piece you put together. i'll ponder on it and re-read it to make sure it soaks in.

to everyone else thanks for making me better at the hobby that i enjoy

[SMOKE FREAK]

The best and quickest way to annoy people is to ignore fact based advice and listen to some bloke you met on the internet instead :-)

Alex....Doesn't that describe all of us here.......Some bloke from the internet...

Sorry...I couldn't resist...

Actually I been avoiding this thread because I am not an expert on curing...
But Im pretty sure while salt has some preservative effect it is NOT the same as a cure...

My personal view is that cold smoked ribs, cured or not, will lack all the best parts of smoked ribs...Im thinkin that the meat will not have the right texture as what you get from hot smoked ribs...Period...Wont be any bark at all...And the fat will not be rendered....Oh wait ....Ya mentioned boiling...That will remove a lot of fat and most of the flavor...Seriously...

If your smoker wont hit high enough temps then you should seriously consider other cooking methods....Do you own a grill?...Gas or charcoal....I used to make some pretty good ribs before I got into smoking by cooking for a couple hours foiled in the oven...Then finishing on a hot grill with sauce...Turning often...This would work too with your "properly cured" ribs...Just don't boil them and cold smoke...It's not gonna give you the end results you want...

But that's just me...

[dragos28]

Curious Aardvark, you make some very good points, and i thank all of you who have contributed to this thread. I do not want to come across as "stuck in my ways"
i will abandon my idea because just like i abandoned the galvanized pipe on my smoker, i just don't want to take the risk.

CA, can you please talk to me some more about using Cure 1 & 2...
when i cured the pork loins, they came out just a tad bit salty.. i assumed that i needed to let them sit in cold water longer...

i am going by what my dad has taught me, and he is of the old school, where its only salt and all the other nitrates nitrites are no-no's...

i'm going to renounce the cold smoked pork ribs... i'll just do them on my dad's hot smoker when and if i'm feeling like ribs....
but i would like to learn more about the curing salts and how to use them properly... as others have mentioned, over use could be very dangerous....

[Mark R]

Drago read through the stickies here
http://www.smoked-meat.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=70

[Fishawn]

And if you need something that will grill, smoke, and do just aboot anything else, look into a Weber kettle, the 22.5" model. They are inexpensive new, bulletproof, and can be found on Craigslist pretty cheap and sometimes free.

Good Luck

[crusty ol salt]

i'm going to renounce the cold smoked pork ribs... i'll just do them on my dad's hot smoker when and if i'm feeling like ribs....
but i would like to learn more about the curing salts and how to use them properly... as others have mentioned, over use could be very dangerous....

hey dont give up on your idea. I know that several here have tired to convince you hot smoked ribs are the way to go. i also read thru the thread and l see an underlying current that says if you are going to do a cold smoke, do it this way and be safe.

if a was a betting man i would bet there could be a couple of cold smoke rib threads breaking out here very soon.

Good luck on what ever way your heart takes you

[chefrob]

CA, can you please talk to me some more about using Cure 1 & 2...
when i cured the pork loins, they came out just a tad bit salty.. i assumed that i needed to let them sit in cold water longer...

that's just it, when you come up with a formula that suits you there is no soaking in water 'cuz you control the amount of salt used. for now i would only concentrate on cure#1, cure#2 is for long term curing. a simple ratio that works for ME is 1-7-5. that is for every pound of meat, 1 gm cure #1, 7 gm kosher salt and 5 gm raw sugar. i use this for bacon, buckboard bacon, tenterloins and loins and i don't see why you couldn't use it on your ribs. i never have to soak my meats to get rid of that saltyness and all of the other flavors that i use in my cures don't dilute as well.

[curious aardvark]

Potassium N's lethal dose in rabbits is 1.9g/Kg body weight. No human figures.
Sodium N's LD has been 321 Mg/Kg body weight.

yep - pretty much what I said - but in reference to people not rabbits :-)

Basically the reason potassium nitrate is no longer widely used is because sodium salts are a lot more effective at controlling bacterial levels.

You can O.D on potassium nitrate - but it's on the same level as od'ing on sodium chloride (table salt). basically don't eat it neat, from the pot, with a spoon.

As far as sodium nitrate goes - never buy it neat to start with always buy a commercially produced curing salt that only has trace amounts of the chemical mixed in.

There are only really three rules to follow when curing food.

1) always buy premixed curing salts - never try and mix your own.
2) always follow the maximum usage amounts written on the packet.
3) For short curing - a week or less, use cure #1 which is nitrite only
For long curing - over a week use cure #2 - contains both nitrite & nitrate.

You can use less curing salt than recommended (i frequently do in marinades), but never more.

That's pretty much it.