Hickory Smoked Maple Flavored Bacon from Pork Bellies
Cut the bellies into nice squared off pieces that will be about what you might want to use. Some people keep them whole but I like piece that are easy to work with. This belly which was 14 pounds I cut into three pieces. Save the scraps for Baked beans, clam chowder or anything you might use salt pork for.
To making regular bacon or belly bacon you need to brine or pickle them. You can purchase curing packages from various suppliers or make you own. I choose to make my own.
1 gallon of ice water at 38-40 degrees
1 cup powdered dextrose (corn sugar)
1/2 cup real maple syrup
1 cup Kosher salt or Sea Salt
* Prague powder #1
· NOTE: You may use Instacure, Morton’s Tender Quick or Prague Powder #1 just be sure to follow the manufactures instructions on how much to use based on the weight of the meat you intend to cure!
Mix all your ingredients and make sure they are dissolved well. Place meat in the brine and pump your bellies with brine to about 8% of green weight. After weighting and reweighting the bacon several times this seems to come out to about the same as injecting the all over meat at intervals of about 2 inches apart.
Pumping is simply injecting the meat with the brine water.
Chill at 38-40 degrees for about 5 or 6 days. Make sure the meat is fully submerged in the water. The best way I know of to do this is to either put a plate with something heavy on the meat or use a vacuum sealer – which is what I do. Turn the meat every few days.
After about 5 to 7 days remove the meat and rinse it really well under luke warm water. Pat the meat dry with paper towels and start you smoker while it dries out some. Bring the smoker up to 130°F to 135°F with the dampers wide open and no wood. If your smoker doesn’t have dampers prop open the lid. Place the water pan in the smoker but do not add water – this will just act as a heat shield for the meat.
Once temperatures are stable place the meat in the smoker and allow the surface of the meat to dry for about an hour. This is important that the surface be dry because the smoke will not penetrate wet meat evenly (if at all) and your bacon end up looking blotchy with uneven color.
After the surfaces of the meat have become dry close the dampers to 1/4 open or close the lid and add wood to smoke the meat until internal temp hits 128°F. Don’t go beyond this or you be cooking the meat.
I’ve decided that I personally prefer to smoke my bacon using a 50-50 mix of Hickory and Apple occasionally throwing in some Cherry or using all Cherry for the last several hours. It gives it a nice mahogany color with a slightly sweeter aroma. Orange wood also adds nice color to the bacon.
Reduce temperature of your smoker and smoke your bacon until it turns a nice reddish-brown. When the color looks right you, remove the bacon and chill at least overnight. Don’t try eating it right away or you may be disappointed. It needs to firm up and let the flavors meld.
You find it much easier to slice bacon when it’s chilled almost to freezing – stiff but not frozen solid. This will be the best bacon you ever ate - and it's never greasy!
Here the last batch right out of the smoker.
