Buckboard Bacon..So easy..So good..Pics Inside!!!


 

Nick Burns

New member
My first post so bare with me. I love bacon. I found the recipe on this site and it worked!! Better than the post even!

First I called around for porkbelly. The local hot butcher had it for $3.60 a pound. I went to the Asian market and it was $1.99 a pound!

I bought two 4 pound boneless slabs. I also picked up a 5 pound pork butt. What the hell it was crazy cheap and you can't do a butt bad.

I purchased the buckboard bacon cure online for $7. I also got jerky cure. I will try that soon as well. It taked 10 days for the cure to do it's thing so I rubbed the cure on the meat on Thursday. I had the meat in my girlfriends fridge and had her turn the meat on Monday. That following Sat would be smokeing time!

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Fire up the smoker. I only used about 15 coals and one large soaked in water Mesquite wood chunk. It lasted the entire 4 hour cook at 200 degrees. Don't worry the smoker looks closer to the fence than it really is.

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Clean the grates and foil the pan. I will be getting the clay pot for my next smoke.

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The butts are on the bottom with a chicken. On top are the porkbellys and scraps. The cooked scraps I used in my lentil soup and bacon fried rice! NICE!!

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A few hours in...

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She done! temp inside was 140-142.

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Pork butt looked like it came from a very expensive deli. It was awesome.

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First taste were the scraps. Fully cooked. Tasted like Taylor ham if you’re from the East.

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The pork butt was better than the streaky american style porkbelly bacon. Less fat, more meat, so much bacon smell when I cooked it. Fantastic!! and CHEAP!!

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I vacuum sealed most of it and I am giving it to friends and family. When it is all gone I am going to do more butt less porkbelly.

More on the taste: It is EXACTLY like store bought bacon but with a nice hint of smoke, much more meat, and the smell is so much stronger in the house. Everyone will know you are cookin bacon! You MUST make this. I hope to never buy store bought paper thin bacon ever again.

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Nick, I have done several hundred pounds of buckboard bacon. Next time make your own cure. 50/50 mix of tenderquick and brown sugar. After cureing and soaking, tie it up for shape and while smoking, inject it with real maple syrup and apple juice, 50/50 mix. You will never go back! John. PS, I always use boneless butt, not the bellys.
 
Looks goooooood! In fact, I've half a mind to go fry up some of my own.

The ingredients list maple sugar, but I may just add a cup of maple syrup next time I do the BB.

I fully appreciate your inclination to never buy store bought bacon again.
 
That bacon looks fantastic! I just ordered the cure a couple days ago, so I plan on doing my first batch in (5 days shipping, 10 days curing, wait for a sunday) probably 20 days
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I wanted to ask, is there a big taste difference between porkbelly and butt? Does the butt have the same taste as "store bought" bacon?

Brandon
 
The buckboard bacon that I made was with a butt - it reminded me more of country ham than regular bacon. Very tasty.
 
Someone posted recently that he shared some bacon that he made and they asked him "Why bother, you can buy the stuff?"

I won't get into the difference in quality, but can you buy the sense of accomplishment you got from making such fine stuff?

That cook should give his friends the URL of your post - maybe they will get a glimmer of what is going on.
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Brandon, I did not taste a big difference in the pork belly over the butt. I was surprised because most people say the butt tastes more like ham. Mine fried up like bacon. The directions say to cut the butt into 3 inch by 3 inch strips. With one good butt I got two of these the rest were the smaller "scraps". This way the cure will go all the way through most of the meat in 10 days. If you have a full 6-8+ inch thick butt it won't cure all the way through. Because the scraps were so thin and cured with the rest for 10 days they tasted more like Taylor Ham which is stronger. The biggest difference is there was way more meat and less fat on the butt.

Rich, That was my post and thanks for your reply. I do like turning nothing into something.

With the scraps of bacon I just made a quick batch of lentil soup. (perfect for the colder weather) This time I used only lentils, garlic, water and the bacon scraps instead of a ham hock. Nothing else. It was GREAT. So much flavor and so easy. Simmered for just under two hours. Try it.
 
It's funny that my post was the last one in this thread, as I am finally going to be putting my bacon on the smoker tomorrow.

I cured 2 8# butts.

I'll let you know how it turns out.
 

 

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