Makin’ the Bacon–Part II Smokin’

Q.  You mentioned in your last blog about you having an idea to make bacon.  How exactly do you go about doing that?

In Part I we wet-cured the bacon using a brine and now we’re going to smoke the bacon…indoors.  I’m using Wright’s liquid smoke to get the smoky flavor, but you could also put hickory chips and water in the bottom of the  roasting pan to achieve the same effect.  Liquid smoke is an all natural product made from hickory, applewood or mesquite wood that is burned inside a chamber. As the smoke rises it is captured in a condenser and it cools. The cooled smoke forms water droplets (condensation). These droplets are then collected and filtered twice.  I use hickory in this recipe, mainly because I bought a gallon jug of it from Gordon Food Service (GFS).

Here is the step by step process to smoke the bacon.  

1. Put your oven rack on the lowest level and heat your oven to 170 degrees.
2. Take the pork out of the zip-lock bag and pat it dry. 
3. If you prefer, liberally sprinkle the pork belly with pepper.  As pictured below.
4. Mix 2 ounces of liquid smoke with 8 ounces of water and pour it into the bottom of the roasting pan.
5. Place the pork bellies on a rack, with the pork skin up in the roasting pan.
6. Cover with a tent made with aluminum foil; this will give you a smoke effect.
7. Bake at 170 degrees for 8 hours.
8. Remove from the heat and it should look beautiful!  The reasons it’s more brown than pink that what you would see normally in your grocery store are twofold – it’s been cooked AND there are no nitrates.
9. Let the meat cool for a few hours then remove the skin. You can then sell the pigskin to the National Football League!

10.  The result? You have cooked bacon and you can eat it the way that it is.  Or you can slice it and cook it further, either baking or fry it up in a pan.

Please be sure to watch this space for Part III – in which I’ll give you alternatives to this process – in terms of flavor and smoking.

I like to think of FoodProductLaunch.com as the culmination of all my life-long food experiences, starting with working with my grandmother and mother canning fruits and vegetables when I was a youngster.  I want you to experience the same things that I have to go from Your Kitchen to the Marketplace. 

TJ Gallivan

© foodproductlaunch.com 2014 All Rights Reserved.  We encourage you to repost this blog in its entirety.  If you choose to use portions of it…give credit where credit is due.

Makin’ Bacon! Part I – The Cure

Q.  You mentioned in your last blog about you having an idea to make bacon.  How exactly do you go about doing that?

As you may know from reading my blogs I’m into making my own homemade things that most people just purchase at the store.  I really enjoy making pickles, canning jalapeños, making jam and putting up vegetables.   I’ve been known to make my own sausage, jerk my own beef and recently I’ve made my own bacon. 

The reason I enjoy creating things in my own kitchen is because whatever I make turns out better than what I can buy in the store.  In the case of bacon, it was fairly simple and because it contained no additives, like sodium nitrate, it’s much healthier. 

Another thing that I don’t really like to do is reinvent the wheel, so I took two recipes and combined them – one for the brine to Cure the pork belly  and the other for the method of smoking the bacon in an oven as opposed to using a smoker.  Even then I couldn’t leave it just at that, so I modified the recipes, combined them and created my own. 

So without much further ado – here’s Part I of my methodology for makin’ bacon! 

Ingredients:

• 6 pounds of fresh pork belly. 
• Ask your butcher to cut it into two 3 pound slabs
• 1/2 gallon water
• 6 ounces of Kosher or pickling salt
• 4 ounces dark brown sugar
• (1/2 ounce molasses and 4 ounces of sugar)
• 2 ounces liquid smoke (because I’m not really smoking it)

Curing Method:

1. Mix the water, sugar, salt and liquid smoke in a medium sized mixing bowl
2. Place the pork belly in a gallon zip-log bag or a plastic container with a lid.  Pour as much brine over the meat as will fit in the bag/container.  In a container, you may have to weigh the pork belly down in order for the brine to completely cover the meat.
3. Place in the refrigerator for 72-96 hours.
4. If you’ve put it in a zip lock bag as pictured here, be sure to flip it every day to make sure the pork is fully cured.

Please be sure to watch this space for Part II – in which I’ll cover all the steps necessary to finish the process.

FoodProductLaunch.com has long been something that I’ve longed to do, which is to help as many of you as possible go from Your Kitchen to the Marketplace.  We take the scary out of the process!

TJ Gallivan

© foodproductlaunch.com 2014 All Rights Reserved.  We encourage you to repost this blog in its entirety.  If you choose to use portions of it…give credit where credit is due.

On Flexibility

Q.  You seem to have many interests when it comes to the food business – from your product list alone, you’re producing sauces, jams, rubs and other things like chili.  What do you think is the most important thing to success for your clients?

Wow…that one is really a hard one. 

I think that we assume that our clients have a passion for what they’re doing and enough money to support them and their food habit.  If I had to choose one, it would be flexibility and an ability to adapt.

When I first started down this path after being a nerd in the area of systems engineering, I thought that just creating my own signature pasta sauce which is THE.BEST.EVAH was good enough.  I thought that the business would just come because the sauce was so good.  What I didn’t realize then that I do now is that I do not have a passion for retail sales. 

I’ve worked with people in the past who didn’t have that flexible approach to business and were what I would consider one trick ponies.   If I came up with an idea to do something, I’d get answers like, “we’re not going to expand our product line,” or “that’s too labor intensive to make a go of it,” or ‘”we’ve never done that before,” or some other excuse to not even give things a try. 

I always wanted to hear the answer of “Why Not?” 

I’ve found that if I had stuck to my first thought and wasn’t flexible enough to change that I would not have found success.  In changing the fundamental aspect of what I was doing I found a renewed passion.

My newfound plan of attack is to take the facility that I have my eye on for purchase and utilize it in many new ventures.  By using the facility in a flexible manner and taking a “Why Not?” approach, I think I can scratch as many of my personal itches as I want.

I want to make pickles of all kinds.  I want to pickle jalapeños and other hot peppers.  I have an idea to make bacon and sausages.  I want to have a street vendor license and sell take out Italian sausages with peppers and onions and my pasta sauce, and hot dogs Buffalo or Chicago style. 

I want to open up my facility to people who want to start their own food business, whether that’s baking pies and cakes and cupcakes or starting a catering business or creating sauces or selling sandwiches to go from a roach coach. 

I want my community to know that I am a force to be reckoned with when helping startups startup.

FoodProductLaunch.com is my grand idea and my great passion.  I want to help as many of you as possible go from Your Kitchen to the Marketplace.  We take the scary out of the process!

TJ Gallivan

© foodproductlaunch.com 2014 All Rights Reserved.  We encourage you to repost this blog in its entirety.  If you choose to use portions of it…give credit where credit is due.