Bacon without curing?


 
S Riddell

S Riddell

TVWBB Super Fan
Stopped at an Asian market on my home from work and impulse bought a pork belly. Is it possible to make bacon without tender quick or similar curing agent?
 
You can use regular salt. That is the way they used to do it for centuries. I've made unsmoked bacon lots of times with regular salt and some sugar. It will have a shorter shelf life than smoked bacon, but you can freeze it, and of course smoke it if you want to.
 
Well, everybody...here is my issue..family member with migraines and aversion to nitrites(ates), so I was asked if I could prepare without the TQ and after having seen the Benton video...I guess I could do so. But : 1. Does any one here have a real recipe for doing some bacon this way ? 2. Is there any other way to get the meat color we all like ? ( I have often wondered how much material is really needed if all we are wanting is the coloring aspect ) 3. I use butts boned out and broken down for the 22 kettle, with the meat cut in 2 lengthwise for two 3.5 lb slabs ready for the dry rub. Oh, thanks a bunch...Dave
 
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David DeVivo said:
Well, everybody...here is my issue..family member with migraines and aversion to nitrites(ates), so I was asked if I could prepare without the TQ and after having seen the Benton video...I guess I could do so. But : 1. Does any one here have a real recipe for doing some bacon this way ? 2. Is there any other way to get the meat color we all like ? ( I have often wondered how much material is really needed if all we are wanting is the coloring aspect ) 3. I use butts boned out and broken down for the 22 kettle, with the meat cut in 2 lengthwise for two 3.5 lb slabs ready for the dry rub. Oh, thanks a bunch...Dave
Click to expand...

I use this recipe. Substitute table salt for the pink/curing salt. Doesn't come out bright pink, but tastes great.

http://saucissonmac.blogspot.com/2009/10/taking-back-bacon.html
 
A recipe? The traditional one goes like this, add 2,5% of salt to the weight of the meat, and some sugar. Cure in the fridge for three days or more, the thicker the meat slab the longer the cure. For very thick pieces of meat, you would like to find some veins and inject salt water into the veins.

Regarding your nitrite/migraine relative he/she should consider giving up a very bad habit. Namely swallowing your own spit, because it contains much more nitirites than it is normally possible to get from food. He/she should also stop eating several of the quite common vegetables.
I think it is almost impossible to get the artificial red color on the meat without using nitrites, celeery juice or the salt. If you for some reason want to stay away from nitrites, you just have to sacrifice the red color. And the slight change of taste.
 
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Smoking bacon cured without nitrites has some requirements. You need to hot smoke it, not cold smoke. Cold smoking requires the use of nitrites to prohibit growth of bacteria while in the temperature danger range (40F to 140F). If you hot smoke your bacon, you should be fine. Geir Widar's insightful post is eye opening, but likely your relatives are committed to their anti-nitrite views and life is too short for a family squabble over chemistry. So you might serve a spinach salad and see if they go into toxic nitrate shock (joking here), but odds are they routinely get a lot more nitrate/nitrite in their diet through other sources than processed meat and it won't make a bit of difference to them if you point it out.

So, make your bacon with salt and sugar, hot smoke it if you smoke it at all. Be sure to "hot finish" it to 150F in your oven if you don't smoke it. I regularly do that with my bacon that IS cured with nitrite. Or I hot smoke it to an internal temperature of 150F. Simply because I share it with folks like myself that are in the "at risk" category due to age or medical conditions.
 
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I totally agree that there are other things to talk about than nitrites during family dinners. Thank you for adding that, I should have written something about it. :)
 
Geir Widar said:
A recipe? The traditional one goes like this, add 2,5% of salt to the weight of the meat, and some sugar. Cure in the fridge for three days or more, the thicker the meat slab the longer the cure. For very thick pieces of meat, you would like to find some veins and inject salt water into the veins.

Regarding your nitrite/migraine relative he/she should consider giving up a very bad habit. Namely swallowing your own spit, because it contains much more nitirites than it is normally possible to get from food. He/she should also stop eating several of the quite common vegetables.
I think it is almost impossible to get the artificial red color on the meat without using nitrites, celeery juice or the salt. If you for some reason want to stay away from nitrites, you just have to sacrifice the red color. And the slight change of taste.
Click to expand...

I'd try curing with celery juice. That way you can call it "nitrite free" and see if nitrites are really a trigger.
 
Thanks all for the input. No obsession here regarding nitrites....simply a conservative approach following a mind blowing migraine and no need for even a most remote chance for an encore . ( must not be any sufferers in the crowd. ) Dave
 
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