Canadian Bacon And An Old Friend’s Demise

While we’ve discussed erecting a more permanent cooking area, my BBQ area has been covered by a 12’x12’ pop-up canopy for a few years.  After persevering through the summer sun, the winter colds, and several hail storms, its loyal service to me was finally ended by a strong wind the other day.  The material was pretty well rotten and full of holes from hail, so I wasn’t surprised and I’m now looking for just a new cloth – the frame is still fine.

For our Christmas meal, which I took no photos of, I brined and stuffed some thick pork chops and since I had a big pot of brine and several pork loin roasts in the freezer, I decided to make some Canadian bacon – Bev had been requesting it for a few months.  I trimmed the roasts of all fat and silver skin and brined them for six days.  I soaked them for a couple of hours in three changes of cold water as my last ones were too salty.

After drying in the fridge for a day (suggested by Chris at Nibble Me This in his Canadian bacon post), I smoked them at 220* to an internal temp of 150*.  Check out Chris’s post for a good step-by-step how to - I cooked mine at 220* vs. his 250* to get more smokiness and color than I’d gotten in the past.  This is my finished product.

The first meal was an open faced Egg McLarry.

Next up was scrambled eggs and cheese sided with Canadian bacon, raspberries, and an English Muffin half.

The third offering was Canadian bacon hash, originally designed to be with par-boiled potatoes, onion, sweet pepper, and mushrooms, but Bev advised we had no potatoes (hard to believe) and suggested I use the remaining tater tots from lunch (yep, that was the entire lunch).  So I warmed the tater tots in the toaster oven to crisp them, while I sauteed the mushrooms and onions (no peppers either).  When the onions were tender, I added the halved tater tots and Canadian bacon to the pan and started a couple of sunny side up eggs.

The flavors went together very well and the crunch of the tater tots was a nice addition.  

I thought the smokiness and salt of the Canadian bacon were just right in the bacon (perhaps a little too smoky for some tastes) and while I'd like it to be a little darker, I doubt I'll get it without some sort of rub, which I don't want to add.

I'm now responding to your comments and hoping you will stop back by - photos best if enlarged by clicking on them.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by Almost Heaven South.

Larry

1/3/13 – 1/18/13 meal dates