Your bacon is a scam. You bought it six days ago but it's already turning grey at the edges. There's a smell when you open the package, something sour and chemical. By day seven, it's slimy and you throw it away. Now travel back to 1547. An Austrian farmer salted a pig, smoked it with beech wood, and hung it in his cellar. Sixteen months later, his family ate that ham on Easter Sunday. It wasn't just safe, it even tasted better than fresh. Required: Salt, wood smoker and essentials, meat. Discuss.
I grew up around my grandparents,, old country folks ,,I would go with grandpa to the grocery store ,, Grandpa would ask the meat butcher for fat and bones ,, for his dogs ,, my grandpa would get a big box of trimmed fat and bones ,, back then ,, the butcher would throw out them scraps ,,, I used them traits from my grandpa yrs later in my hometown in the late 80s . The butcher would save left over beef and pork pieces and bones from processes for pickup ,, grandpa claimed they were for his dogs ,, which wasn't 100% untrue . Anyway ,, the stores ,, especially in bigger municipalities,, would throw away a lot of meat ,, my grandparents would use this leftover meat and bones for seasoning for greens ,,, Collards ,, beans ,, etc ,, . I used my grandparents tactics in my bigger city AO yrs later. It worked for a while ,, then they started charging for the throw away scraps . But ,, like grandma used to do ,, some of them scraps ,, especially the pig tails ,, take the things ,, put on a plate ,, completely cover them with salt ,, rub it in ,, and let it sit on the counter ,, come home from work,, run in more salt. ,,, do this everyday ,, till the salt does not show any moisture , or wet salt ,, around the slab of meat ,,, that was the best seasoning for collards and beans I've ever had. Now ,, the grocery stores don't do their own butchering ,, and getting these pieces is hard to come by .
The big question is, if necessary, could we learn those skills quickly and if the answer isn't an immediate and confident 'YES' then shouldn't we learn them now... The good thing is mankind not only survived but prospered with these skills so that alone should tell us they are as necessary as making fire. EDIT: I think I need a good book on meat preservation. Any recommendations?
at the risk of hijacking the thread,,,but in the spirit of the topic il put this in. smoking meat is awesome. i have had a foodsaver vac sealer and did do some of my moose with it. i got to borrow a chamber vac sealer for first time and while it was not much faster the results are vastly superior. so last week i got a free vacmaster 120 chamber vac. 1800$ new. its slow as the lid is motorized so 45 sec. to 1 minute per bag. the sealer is not working and man,,, they really dont want you working on it. on some models the transformer has a fuse. i wish i could see the damn thing! anyway a control board or relay is probably the problem i just have to disassemble it enough to test the relay and board while its plugged in and cycling. vac, lid, everything else works great. 30" of vac. so once i fix it il have a awesome vac sealer. vac seal your smoked meats and years from now its still good. i think a chunk of 5yo halibut is the oldest i have personally eaten. a vac sealer is worth the investment.unless you have no power, then its a 58lb boat anchor.
Ha ha ha another old Horn Dog. That's the first thing I thought of. Turns out it's just Brokor and his damn click-bait.
Don't know but pink salt, most cures and saltpeter all used nitrate to be sure and not get botulism in the meat. Folks were awful careful about it in canning or curing foods. Don't take much to kill you and used to happen. Killed animals in fall after it got cold, cured hams, bacon, and sausage. Smoke house had two fireboxes, one outside for cold smoke and one inside for smoking and cooking. Made jerky and canned beef for most part. By the time I came along they were storing frozen foods in a centralized locker plant in town. About 20 to 30 below and just bring enough meat out to the house for a few days and keep in fridge. Hams and such were cured for a few weeks, cold smoked, and stored where it was dry and cool. Hams and bacon could go a couple years. Ate a lot of salt pork, with beans or in soup, as well. Food storage was an art everyone used to learn by growing up doing it. Lard was just as important as bacon and there was a jar on stove for pan drippings. Bacon fat was saved and used to fry foods. Always kept all fats, boil them in water to clean them, and use them with Louis Lye to make soaps a few times a year. No fat from a hog was ever thrown away. Used to raise breeds of hogs that had lots of fat for the lard. Here is a copy of the Morton salt book that is similar to the one we used in the 1940's. Morton Salt Company - Home Meat Curing Guide - 2005 | PDF | Curing (Food Preservation) | Ham We used this to eat safely so it had several elements that while were used for a long time are no longer "cool". Propolene glycol, saltpeter, etc. Made up our own cures, but dad always used store bought cures for business as it was safer and less likely to go wrong.
