Canadian Bacon

Wednesday was BBQ say at Almost Heaven South, but with Bev leaving town for a week, I only ended up with a half pound of pulled chicken for us. I gave most of the chicken to Wende, and cooked one whole pork butt, two briskets, and three slabs of baby backs for friends. Since this was just the usual fare, I didn’t take any shots of it. But you can see my typical BBQ by clicking on the link or by looking at BBQ under Labels.

One thing that was a little different was the piece of Canadian bacon I’d cured then smoked on Wednesday – the title picture.

Canadian bacon is expensive to buy, but inexpensive to make, especially when the loin is bought on sale for $2/lb. If you like it and would like to try your hand at curing meat, this is a good one to start with. It can be as simple as buying a box of Morton’s Tender Quick at the market, dry curing in your frig, and smoking it on your gas grill. This is the very basic method and will turn out some pretty good product – here’s the curing link. Once cured, it can be eaten as is (but remember it’s still raw) or it can be smoked. The piece I showed above was cured and frozen, then thawed and smoked. I won’t do this again as meat gives up too much moisture when frozen - the liquid left on the dish after thawing- so the bacon was a little dryer than normal. Once you dry cure, you can expand into injecting and brine curing if you like.

Here’s a link from Len Poli which I’m providing more for smoking instructions, but it also has the recipe for brine curing. The cure #1 referred to is available from sausage making supply companies such as The Sausage Maker as Insta Cure 1. You can turn any grill into a smoker by heating one side of it to achieve the desired temperature on the other (cooking) end and laying foil pouches containing wood chips over the heated burner or charcoal to generate the smoke.

Then, in case you’re not sure what to do with the bacon, try this.


I didn’t get the cheese melted enough as I forgot to start the toaster oven prior to cracking the egg, but it was still good.

Have a great day.

Larry