First pork belly ?'s


 
T

Terry G

New member
I'm trying the Ruhlmans maple cured bacon. I pick up 20-30 pounds of belly tonight(minimum order). Now for the newbie questions:
I'm in Canada and couldn't find pink salt. I have a product called Super cure from Yes Group. The Cure contains salt, sodium nitrite(6.4%), sodium bicarbonate, glycerine. I have been advised to use 3g cure/kg meat with 20g kosher salt/kg meat. I will be adding the maple syrup and maple sugar(easy to find up north with all the Mennonites) as per the recipe. I'm wondering if anyone with more experience and knowledge of ingredients thinks this sounds about right???
I don't want to ruin all that pork!!
Mortens TQ is not an option up here either.
I'm thinking of doing half to be sure and freezing the rest just in case this doesn't turn out.

Thanks in advance!

Terry
 
Sorry for the double post but I did some math to compare with the original recipe:


Original
Maple Cured Bacon What I've been told with Super cure
One 5 lb. piece of pork belly, rind on 5lb or 2 1/4kg2 ounces kosher salt 1.6oz or 45g1/4 C. pure Maple syrup Same2 t. pink salt (a curing salt, not the Hawain stuff) 6.75g or 1.35 teaspoons1/4 C. Maple sugar (pricey, worth it) Same
 
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Hi, that sounds okay but I think MartinF has mentioned that some of Ruhlman's recipes are a bit high on the Cure #1 amount. I have made a very similar recipe using Maple Syrup but no maple sugar since that, like the Mennonites, is quite rare in the Philippines. The US FDA has Cure #1 aka Instacure #1 or Prague Powder #1 at 6.25 percent content for Sodium Nitrite. I am not sure what the Canadian specifications are, but I thought that our cousins to the North used pretty much the same stuff as in the USA. The cure I purchased from Allied Kenco a few months back had pretty much the identical ingredients you mentioned.
 
Thanks Steve that cure calculator will come in handy and the amounts I've listed seem about right.

Thanks Steve A, the package said 6.4%. Just a little nervous doing a trial run with that much belly. I'll know next Sunday.
 
Just for S&Gs I entered 5 pounds (2,268 grams) into the cure calculator and it said that I'd need 2336.9 grams (5.15 pounds) of cure. Does that sound right? I've never cured anything before, but do you really need more cure than meat? Seems excessive. I didn't change any of the other parameters in the calculator. Thanks for anyone's input.
 
Martina's calculator is for equilibrium brining, not dry curing, so disregard those results.

Your Super Cure is pretty close to Cure #1 - close enough for me.

My book calls for 0.05 oz. or 1.45 g per pound of skin-off belly.

I think I'd follow the Super Cure recipe.
 
Jon Des. said:
Martina's calculator is for equilibrium brining, not dry curing, so disregard those results.
Click to expand...
Do you mean MartinF's calculator? I used the measurements based on that for a dry cure using Michael Ruhlman's method. Does that mean it's not going to cure it properly? MartinF?
 
The calculator can be used for either dry curing or equilibrium brining.

Because the nitrite value is a bit different in the Super Cure, the calculator won't be exactly correct in this instance.
Use 2.5 grams or 1/2 a level tsp. of nitrite per 1000g. of belly, that will be very close to the 156ppm.
The salt is just a little bit more than what I use, I would use 18grams of salt per 1000 grams of belly, but if you have a salt tooth, go ahead and use more.
The sugar level, or maple in this case, is a matter of personal preference.

I hope to have some examples on the calculator page sometime soon (along with a recipe/formula scaler), so it's easier to understand the many ways it can be used.


Cheers, peace and bacon grease,
~Martin

Uq8f9.jpg


Click here to check out the Universal Cure Calculator!!!!!
 
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Chad M. said:
Just for S&Gs I entered 5 pounds (2,268 grams) into the cure calculator and it said that I'd need 2336.9 grams (5.15 pounds) of cure. Does that sound right? I've never cured anything before, but do you really need more cure than meat? Seems excessive. I didn't change any of the other parameters in the calculator. Thanks for anyone's input.
Click to expand...

No, that's definitely not correct, you've listed the total of all ingredients! Please read up on curing and curing safety before you cure anything!!

Here's a very good place to start......

http://www.wedlinydomowe.com/sausage-making/curing
http://www.wedlinydomowe.com/sausage-making/curing/methods
http://www.wedlinydomowe.com/sausage-making/curing/sausages
http://www.wedlinydomowe.com/sausage-making/curing/making-brine
http://www.wedlinydomowe.com/sausage-making/curing/nitrates

The correct and safe amount of cure #1 for 5lbs. (2267.95 g.) of meat with the pre-set values in the calculator, is just 5.66 g.

~Martin
 
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MartinF DiggingDogFarm said:
No, that's definitely not correct, you've listed the total of all ingredients! Please read up on curing and curing safety before you cure anything!!

The correct and safe amount of cure #1 for 5lbs. (2267.95 g.) of meat with the pre-set values in the calculator, is just 5.66 g.

~Martin
Click to expand...

Duh. That makes much more sense.
 
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