Dry Curing Bacon #2 - Enhancing and personalising flavours in your dry cures

In my simple dry cure recipe I mentioned that it was really just a base from which to experiment. In addition to the basic Salt, Sugar, Garlic Powder, Cure #1 and Pepper that I used there are allsorts of additions you might like to make to get something perfect for your personal tastes! Here are a few suggestions for flavourful additions to the basic recipe.

Brown Sugar Replacements: I have used Maple Syrup (Sirop d'Erable), Honey (Miel) and Molasses (Melasse) with great sucess, in place of the brown sugar of the basic cure recipe. The Maple Syrup in particular gives a very good flavour to any cured meat. With molasses you need to be a little more careful cos although it can be a great addition, it can easily overpower the flavour of the meat.

Chile Powder/Flakes (Piment Moulu): Thoroughly untraditional addition but I quite like adding a little chile powder to my bacon cures. I wouldn't recommend more than a gram per kilo of meat unless you are a hardened chilehead though! 

Onion Powder/Flakes (Poudre d'Oignon): I could have put this in the basic cure recipe really, as its rare that I dont add both Garlic and Onion to dry cure mixes.

Paprika (Paprika/Pimienton): I use a lot of Paprika and have the great advantage of living not too far from Spain. I buy by the kilo and save loads over the price in France. Usually there are three types available, Mild, Hot and Smoked any are useful for curing, adding both colour and flavour. The smoked version is particularly handy for those who like a smoky taste to their bacon but are not equipped or inclined to smoke the bacon itself! 

Allspice (Piment de la Jamaique): An aquired taste and best to use in only very small quantities, as it can be somewhat overpowering. 

Bay Leaves (Feuille de Luarier): I often used to add Bay Leaves to my wet cures but never to my dry ones, but I discovered that crumpling a couple of leaves quite finely into a dry cure mix makes a great flavour addition.

Juniper Berries (Baies de Genevrier): Very nice traditional addition...again dont use too much,  1g per kilo is about max for me...crushed before adding to the cure. Even better you can get some for free anywhere around here on the Causse. 

Marjoram (Marjolane) or Oregano (Origan): I am fortuante to have a large supply of fresh Wild Marjoram in my garden...it's beutiful fragrance is one of the delights...who am I kidding...THE ONLY DELIGHT...when mowing the (what passes for a) lawn with a push mower on a 45° slope!!!!! I digress, Marjoram and Oregano add a lovely fragrance and subtle flavour to lots of cured meats, so are always worth a thought when making up a new cure.

This is by no means meant to be an exhaustive list, just a few of my fav's. Your imagination and taste buds should be your only bounds. If you have a particular fav addition please leave a comment....and I will add the suggestions to the list........and try a few of the new ones out myself!!

Happy Curing

Guy

Dry Curing Bacon #1 - Belly Pork for Streaky Breakfast Rashers

To cure your own bacon you have basically two choices, either wet cure or dry cure. Wet curing is where you submerge the meat in a solution of water, salt etc, whereas dry curing is a matter of rubbing dry ingredients into the meat to cure it. Dry curing isn't particularly dry though actually, as the meat will very quickly start to release liquid. Its my fav method for making bacons and gammons, so I decided to start off the bacon recipes with a simple cure thats ideal for a first trial but gives excellent results.

Dry curing bacon requires just a little more effort than a wet cure but takes up a little less space. I find that dry cures lend the meat a better flavour than the wet cures in most cases, so 90% of my bacons are dry cured and its worth every bit of the extra effort.

The ingredients you use for a dry cure are somewhat a matter of taste and experimentation. A good base though is essential and quantities need to be carefully controlled, especially when using Sodium Nitrite or the propriatory cures powders (Prague Powders or Cure #1 or #2 ).

A good springboard for later experiments is the following recipe. Here I was doing a simple streaky bacon, but the base cure is just the same no matter what cut you want to make into bacon. 

Basic Dry Cure ( for 5 kgs Pork Belly)

100g  Coarse or Medium Grained Salt
20g    Garlic Powder / Granules
120g  Soft Brown Sugar
12g    Cure #1 (Optional)
20g    Pepper

Put ingredients into a large bowl and mix throughly to ensure an even distribution.

It is important to keep your meat cool at all times, removing from the fridge as briefly as possible at each step. Temperature is very important with extended curing times. Cut meat surfaces are vulnerable to bacteria looking for a darn good feed......just as they are to us! Because some curing techniques can take long periods of time to accomplish a stable and healthy product, any bacteria present may get a fair old crack of the whip at those cut meat surfaces. Ok ....the salt and cure powders will be dealing with many of the potential causes of spoilage, but far, far, better to give the bacteria the least chance possible of doing the dirty on you and giving the cure the chance to really work its magic!

The way we accomplish this is by following good sanitary practices and respect as fully as possible what the french call "la chaine de froid".....which means keeping meat at cold temperatures throughout processing and through to consumption. The colder the temperature, the less active any bacteria will be and as a consquencethey will only reproduce very slowly. A good temperature range that will allow the cure to work properly and ensure nasty conditions for those bacteria is between 0°C and 4°C. Most domestic fridges will easily maintain 4°C.

Remove any bits of rib and any blood adhering to the belly. If you want rind off bacon, you can remove the skin now, but you may find it easier to do more neatly after the cure. If you do remove the skin now, it will make for a slightly shorter curing time...without the barrier of skin the cure will penetrate the fat and meat more easily...just take a day or two off the curing time.

Cut the belly into three roughly equal slabs, wash in cold water, towel dry, then pierce the slabs all over with a point.......I use a skewer. This helps get the cure into the meat and channel moisture out of the meat.

Divide your rub by the number of slabs you have to cure...I will usually make three slabs of bacon out of each side, which gives me two good bits for rashers and a third piece for roasting or cutting up into lardons.

Take each slab and apply the cure to all the meaty surfaces...rub a little on the skin if you have left it on, but concentrate the bulk of the cure on the other side and edges. Be careful to evenly apply the cure all over the meat, paying a little extra attention to holes or folds and all around the edges of the bacon to ensure an even cure.

You will need some sort of sealable container to store your meat safely whilst it cures. If you have space in the fridge for a large plastic tub big enough to fit your slabs into, thats just fine. If you have less room in the fridge you can always use a freezer/cooler box instead and store in a cold place. When I use this method I keep a supply of ice blocks in the freezer and use these to ensure a temperature below 4°C is maintained at all times......changing three blocks every 12 hrs is the price to pay!


Pop your slabs into the container and store in the fridge. Placing slabs on top of each other is fine, just change their order when it comes to overhauling the meat.......Hang on an min.....what does he mean overhauling the meat!! Well.... now your bacon is nicely covered in salt and sugar, it will quickly begin to exude liquid...the salt gets to work fast and you will notice a pool of liquid forming in the bottom of the container after just a few hours. Leave this to accumulate overnight, then open your box, take out the slabs and remove the liquid. Quickly rerub the surfaces of the meat with the remaining cure, massaging them helps get the cure in.  Return meat to the container in the fridge, stacking the slabs in a different order, so that its not always the same piece of bacon at the bottom sitting in the juice. Repeat this "overhaul" every 24 hrs, throughout the curing process.



So how long will all this take?

This very much depends on the thickness of the meat and the saltiness/keeping qualities required. Here we are doing a no nonsense unsmoked streaky bacon...using a supermarket bought belly that weighed in at 6 kilos.....once tidied up and deboned (it had a small section of ribs attached) that gave me 5 kgs of meat to cure! The slabs averaged about 4cm in thickness..so, just over an inch and a half.

A good rule of thumb for dry curing bacon is to allow the cure a week for each inch of thickness of meat. This rule of thumb however will give quite a salty result (although not excessively salty) which will give a bacon that is a good keeper, although not heavily enough salted to be stored out of the fridge or for extended periods. I went for 7 days for my 4cm slabs, as I prefer to err on the side of less salt and rely on vacuum packing and/or freezing for longer term storage.

For a first try I would go with the 7 days per inch of thickness rule of thumb and see how you like it from there.

When the waiting is finally over, remove the slabs from the tub and rinse each throughly under running water to remove any remaining bits of pepper, salt and sugar.  Towel dry then place each slab uncovered in the bottom of the fridge or hang in a shed/garage to dry overnight, this allows the salt to stabilise evenly throughout the meat.

The next morning....... I'm guessing that its surely going to be bacon for breakfast!!!!!

It is however better, to resist temptation and leave the bacon a little longer to mature before packing. This can be done either in the fridge or by hanging the bacon in a cold cellar, garage our outbuilding. You can use hangers from your smoker, butchers S's or just bend up some thick gauge wire and make your own bacon hangers (especially handy if you want to go ahead and smoke the bacon you have just made!) Two or three days is fine...in any case, you can always hang two up and start using the first slab right away...........rather!

When doing a whole belly its probably best to keep one slab in the fridge for immediate (within a week) use and freeze or vac pack the rest. Vac packed in the fridge bacon should be good for upto three or four weeks.....in the freezer a good six months.

This base recipe will make a very good bacon as it is, but can also be smoked for extra flavour. More on that later!

Happy New Year

Guy

Saltpeter, Prague Powder and Curing Salts

There is quite a lot of controversey about the use or otherwise of nitrates in curing. Whilst you will find lots of recipes on the net that call for one or other of the Nitrate/Nitrite based products, you will equally find that many list it as optional and yet still others who do not list it at all.

Traditionally Saltpeter ( Fr: Salpetre) or Potassium Nirate has been used in salt cures as an additive or from impure salts found in certain areas from at least Roman times. The addition of either Potassium or Sodium Nitrate was found to enhance flavour and impart a nice, characteristic pinkish colour to meat that would otherwise look dull and brown when cured by salt alone.

Not only were Nitrates found to enhance the cosmetic and gustative quality of a cured product, but its presence in a cure also prevents any risk of Botulism...which is always handy!! Throughout the twentieth century and to the present day nitrates and or nitrites have been added to cured meats to eliminate this potential health risk.

On the negative side though, Nitrates degrade to Nitrites over time. Infact its these Nitrites  that give the desired effects in the meat. The Nitrites though again over time and under certain conditions can lead to the formation of Nitrosamines, which have been found to be carcinogenic in lab animals.

It is for these reasons that a very precise maximum amounts of Nitrates are regulated for use in cured products and should equally be kept to for home curing.

There are a number of ways in which you can find suitable Nitrate/Nitrite products for your home curing. One simple way is by using Salt that has already had the curing agent added to it. These products take any worry out of dosing, they are just used in the quantity called for by a recipe for Salt. In France you can find these Curing Salts, sometimes in Gamm Vert or by mail order from Meilleurdechef.com.......just look out for Sel Nitrité.

You may be able to get some from a local charcuterie...its always worth an ask....they will often give you a small quantity or sell you some for just a few centimes!

I am currently using the curing powders from sausagemaking.org  they carry both Cure #1 and Cure #2. As I can't find Sel Nitraté in my area for some reason, it makes more sense to me to buy the concentrates by mail order from the UK than order 10 kg sacs mail order in France!!

There are many versions of these curing powders available over the net...you may see them called Prague Powder #1 or #2, simply as Cure #1 and Cure#2 or under propriatory marks, most of which are American products that you will not find in Europe. In each case dosages may be slightly different, so please be careful to take the advice on the packet when using in your cures.

In all my recipes that include a cure powder they are listed as optional....I personally do not cure without it but it is by no means essential if you have the right conditions to cure at controlled, healthy temperatures there should be no problems.

Bacon in France!

One thing that ex pats here in France often complain about missing, is a good old traditional rasher of bacon. Be it streaky, middle or back, there is just none to be had over here, excepting from a few enterprising British butchers who have set up shop for themselves!

To be fair there are a few alternatives available, such as what passes for bacon over here...which is more akin to a Canadian bacon than anything a Brit would recognise as bacon. Whats more, most of this Canadian style bacon you find in France is processed, full of water, limp and extremely bland!

The second shopping option is easy to find and for some an acceptable alternative to bacon. Look out for "Poitrine Salé", "Lard Paysan" or "Poitrine Fumé" (smoked version), in the butchers or supermarket. This is easy to spot becauses it resembles a slab of streaky bacon. Looks promising you might think!! Unfortunately, these products are usually far more heavily salted than bacons are. They might be very good for adding to stews etc, but are not a great candidate for a breakfast rasher for the ol frying pan!

If you like your rashers salty, by all means try it for yourself, some are not too bad. Just be sure to get the butcher to slice it extra thin.....if you ask for a kilo sliced, you will most likely get it in  5 to 10mm strips rather than rashers, if you don't specify.

The really good news is that you can actually make your own REAL bacon at home, cheaply and very easily! You really don't need specialised equipment  (like you do for sausagemaking for example), although odd bits n pieces can be handy or add to the quality of the product.

An easy way to start, is to look out for the pork promotions over the winter in your local supermarkets. Each one does the promo at a different time, so you should not have a lot of problem finding one on...just watch "la pub". Whole bellies are the cheapest way to try your hand at bacon making. A whole belly "en promo" will probably weigh 5 or 6 kilos and cost between 1.40 and 1.80 € the kilo. They also usually have whole loins "longe" available for around 2€ the kilo, if you fancy your hand at a bit of back bacon.

Obviously this is going to be factory farmed and low quality supermarket pork, but its ideal for a trial run....if everything goes horribly wrong you are only out 10€. If it works out to your satisfaction....which I am confident it will.....you can always buy some really good quality free range pork for making truly great bacon in later batches. If you are really lucky, you may even be able to find traditional rare breed pigs available in your area.

Not only is bacon making economic and very simple to do, but there are also a number of different ways you can tailor it to your own taste! So why not give it a go...I am sure you will not regret it!

Back soon with the first of the bacon recipes!

Guy

Last Chile Pepper Harvest of 2009

Well..... the frost came and did its worst to the gardens a little earlier than usual this year. I got in ahead of times and salvaged what I could from the chile and what was left of the tomato beds. Not as much as I hoped for but still there is quite a stock to put through the smoker over the next few days!!

I had been planning to do a Hot Smoked Salmon this weekend, but lack of salmon at the fishshop and the chile pile has meant that it had to be put on hold. Hopefully just until next weekend!

Not all the chiles will be smoked though. The longer thinner ones ( De Arbol ) ones will get strung as much as decorations as edibles. De Arbols are very nice earthy/spicy flavoured chiles that are a great standard for the kitchen. I always grow enough for drying and powders as well as stringing!

There were a few ripe but green chiles here and there..mostly nagas and chocolate habaneros. These are good smoked too, but some will end up in the freezer for curries...most Naga'd restaurant curries in the UK use green rather than red pods.

Now that the garden is mostly finished for the year...its time for a bit of labour yet...ideal for warming the chilled bones this morning, the annual ritual of tearing out dead plants, shredding and making the compost heap very happy!

Spicy Peking Duck Risotto

One last Duck recipe using the leftovers from the Peking Duck. Ok so Risotto isn't Chinese but I love Risotto and there were some leftovers to use up, so I came up with this recipe.

Ingredients
1 Tbsp (15 ml) Dried Shrimp / Crevettes sechées
25 g Mix of Dried Shitake and Black Mushrooms/ Mélange des champignons seches, Shitake et Noir
2 litres Spicy Duck Stock
1 Onion / Oignon
2 Cloves Garlic/ Gousse d'Ail
½ Red Pepper /Poivron Rouge
1 Fresh Chile / Piment 1 tsp (5 ml) Coriander Powder / Coriandre Moulu
1 tsp (5 ml) Cumin Powder / Cumin Moulu
1 Tbsp (15 ml) Olive Oil / Huile d'Olive
1 tsp (5 ml)  Sesame Oil / Huile de Sesame
250 g Arborio Rice / Riz Arborio1 Tbsp (15 ml) Fish Sauce (Nam Pla) / Sauce Poisson (Nam Pla)
1 Tbsp (15 ml) Soy Sauce / Sauce Soja
1 Tbsp (15 ml) Hoisin Sauce / Sauce d'huitres
100g Duck meat and skin from Peking Duck / Restes du Canard Peking Duck
2 Spring Onions / Oignons Tige 

Method

Take the dried shrimps and  mushrooms, place in a bowl, cover with warm waterand leave to soak.

Heat the stock in a large pot until simmering gently, turn down heat but keep it simmering.

Whilst the stock is heating chop and fry the onion, garlic, red pepper, chile, coriander and cumin in the mix of olive and sesame oils until nicely softened.

Remove from pan, leaving as much oil as possible in the pan...you can pour some back off, if there is too much with the veggies. Puree the spicy veg and reserve for later.

In the remaining oil fry the rice for a couple of mins, stirring constantly to avoid sticking. Once the rice is nicely coated with oil, add a couple of Tbsps of the stock, along with the fish, hoisin and soy sauces and stir well. As the liquid disappears start to add a ladle of stock at a time to the pan, stir regularly and ensure that you add more liquid as the rice gets dry. You want to keep the rice at a good simmer and keep adding liquid until the rice is cooked (I like it a bit al dente...about 16 - 18 mins for Arborio but it depends a lot on the rice used).

Once the rice is just about cooked to your liking, add the puree and soaked shrimp and mushrooms along with the liquid they were soaked in. Stir in over the heat until most of the liquor has gone, then remove from heat and cover the pan.

Heat a good 5 mm of oil in a frying pan or wok, quickly fry the chopped duck meat and skin at high temperature for one to two mins.

Serve the risotto with pieces of duck meat over the top accompanied by thin slices of spring onion.

Spicy Duck Stock

Faced with all my leftovers from my Peking Duck post, I thought what would be nicer than making up a batch of Spicy Duck Stock. I had reserved the organs and bits around the neck cut out during the preparation of the Peking Duck, so those and the carcass, stripped of any really useful meat, got chucked with a few extra ingredients into the stock pan.

Homemade stocks always add a little extra something to soup and sauces. Stocks are really easy to make and  freeze well, so there is no rush to use it all up quick. This spicy version can be used as a base stock for many asian style soups and sauces. I like using it for cooking rice....sort of asian style risottos, if you will allow me the liberty.... 

Ingredients......makes 2 litres


5 litres Water / D'eau
Carcass and Offal of 2kg Duck / Carcass et Abats d'un canard
1 Onion / Oignon
1 Shallot / Eschalote
1 Small Red Pepper / Petit Poivron Rouge
Handful Fresh Parsely / Poignée du Persil
Handful Fresh Basil / Poignée du Basilic
2 Tbsp Coriander Seed / Coriandre
1 Tbsp Cumin / Cumin
1 Tbsp Fresh Galangal / Galangal
1 Tbsp  Fresh Turmeric / Curcuma
2 Fresh Chiles / Piments
1 tsp Tamarind Paste /  Pate de Tamarind
1 tsp Salt / Sel
1 tsp Pepper / Poivre

Nice n easy does it...rough chop anything big and add all to stockpot. Bring to the boil, then simmer covered for 2 hrs then remove lid and reduce down to 2 litres. Skim the stock from time to time. Strain and crush/squeeze the dry (well soggy really) matter to get out as much juice as possible.

Leave to cool and store in fridge or freeze for later use.

Peking Duck / Canard Laqué

As I had been planning smoking duck breasts this weekend, then realised that it coincided with Flo's friend visiting I had to come up with something to feed her Saturday night.  So I decided that as there would be smoke and duck already in the air I would give Peking / Crispy Duck a go too.

If anyone else fancies having a go, you will need a duck, some runny honey, sesame seed oil, soy sauce, ginger and a little sherry, unless you happen to have some shao hsing lurking in the store cupboard...

Ingredients

1 x 2 kg Duck / Canard
50 ml Sherry / Vin de Xérès (in France you may have trouble finding this, substitute white port or dry Madera)
1 Tbsp (15 ml) Honey / Miel (the more liquid sort)
1 Tbsp (15 ml) Soy sauce / Sauce Soja
1 Tbsp (15 ml) Sesame Seed Oil / Huile de Sesame
2 tsp (10 ml) Ginger (Powdered) / Gingembre Moulu
1 tsp (5 ml) Pepper / Poivre
1 half tsp (2.5 ml) Chile Powder / Poudre de Piment

For Serving

Hoisin sauce / Sauce Hoisin
Chinese Pancakes / Crepes Chinoises (maybe i should try making these myself too.....hmmmmm......shall have to see)
Spring Onions / Oignon en tige

Preparation

First of all clean the bird and remove any excessive fat and skin from the tail and neck areas. Reserve inards to use later along with the bones for a tasty Duck Soup. Carefully go over the skin and remove any pin feathers n bits that the butcher may have ignored/overseen.

Now take the neck end of the carcass and cut around the neck, then through where it meets the backbone. You should then be able to remove the neck portion entirely..it may require a little pulling. You will end up with a carcass that is open at both ends. This will allow air and more importantly smoke to flow freely through the body cavity of the bird later.

Bring to the boil 5 litres of water. Scold the entire surface of the bird, until it turns white and goes sort of spongy.

Pat dry throughly inside and out with clean tea towels or kitchen paper.

Take a spike or a sharply pointed (thin) skewer and stab the bird all over, but particularly in the meatier areas.

Now its time to make your marinade paste. Mix all the remaining ingredients well.

Ready a container big enough to hold the carcass, then rub the bird inside and out with the paste.

Place the duck in the container breast down and add any remaining paste over the top and distribute as evenly as possible.

Do not close the container, but leave it in the bottom of the fridge or any other suitably cold place for 12 hrs.

12 hrs later, take the box out of the fridge and scrape up any paste in the bottom and rub it back onto and into the duck. Replace the duck in the container, this time breast side up and return to the fridge for a further 12 hrs.

Repeat the overhaul of the duck and turn the bird over once again, so the breast is down. Return to fridge for a further 12 hrs.

Take the duck out of the fridge when ready and rinse inside and out with cold water.

Stuff the duck with clean tea towels, place on another towel or better several in the fridge uncovered for a further 12 hrs. 

The smoking and cooking

On the morning of the smoking, truss the legs and wings of the duck with butchers string. Its a good idea to tie the legs together, so that you have a loop from which to suspend the duck in the smoker.

Now prepare the smoker by placing a large drip tray between the position the duck will be hanging in and the heat source and sawdust. This is very important with duck, as it is quite a fatty bird and will shed quite a bit of fat whilst smoking....this you dont want in your smoldering sawdust.

Hang the duck vertically (tail up) in the smoker and set to about 60° and leave the bird to dry for a good hour without adding any sawdust...No smoke should be applied to the duck until the surface is well dried. If you smoke damp or wet meat you run the risk of creosote deposition on the food....really not nice at all!!

Now reduce the temperature of the smoker as low as possible (if you can turn heat off altogether and just smoke with the heat of the sawdust, thats just great) and leave the duck to cold smoke for 3 hrs.

After three hours in the smoker turn up or reapply heat and bring the smoker to 65 - 70°C. Leave the duck to smoke again for three more hours....replenishing sawdust as required.

After the smoking is finished, take the duck out and move to the kitchen.

Heat the oven to 175°C and place the duck on a roasting rack in a deepish tray or pan, covered with an aluminium foil tent. The duck must be kept out of its own dripping fat during the cooking, a good 2cm of clearance is advised.

Roast until internal temperature reaches about 75°C (upto 2 hrs at 175°C)

Now remove the aluminium foil tent and glaze the duck with a mixture of honey and soy sauce in equal measure (2 heavyhanded tablespoons of each should do the job!)

Turn the oven up to 250°C and roast uncovered for a further 15 mins to crisp up the skin and give the dish its final colouring.

Before carving the duck, let it sit to cool uncovered for 15 mins.

Carve and serve with the Hoisin Sauce, Spring Onions and Pancakes.

The pancakes can be bought or they are easy enough to make according to the recipe on Waitrose (of all places). Chinese Pancakes for Peking Duck. Why not give it a go!

Any bits of meat that don't get eaten can be stir fried the next day with noodles and further leftovers (bones etc) can be added to the organs et al for a warming duck soup.

All the best

Guy

Smoked Duck Breast (Magret Fumé)

Hi again..

Here is the recipe I will be using this weekend as I test out the Cardboard Box Smoker. Its pretty simple and gives very good results.

Ingredients

12 Duck Breasts / Magrets de Canard
5 Kg Sea Salt / Gros Sel
Pepper / Poivre

Method

Place a 2cm layer of the salt into a large glass baking tray (for smaller quantities) or the bottom of a good solid cooler box.

Clean the duck breasts taking care to remove any bloody bits.


Rub each breast throughly on the flesh side and sides with salt, then lay flesh side down in the tray.

Repeat until the tray is full (don't overfill a shallow dish, you need space for more salt).

Once all the breasts are well salted, cover the whole lot with yet more salt.

Pack the salt in well around the breasts, adding more salt if needed so it just covers the surface of the fatty sides of the breasts.

Cover with a tea towel and either leave them 18 to 24 hrs in the bottom of the fridge. If using a cooler box, you can add freezer blocks over the whole caboddle and store them out of harms way. In winter a cold place, say a garage or a barn can substitute for the fridge!

Once the time is up and the breasts are nicely salt cured, take them out of the salt and rinse very throughly before wiping dry.

Grind a little pepper onto the flesh side of the breasts.

Other nice flavour additions can be made before drying. Applying a mixture of honey with a little Cognac, Calvados or Madeira to the breasts before drying is a classy touch. Multi colored pepper corns can also be used to make things look even more attractive. The two magrets to the right were glazed with 50/50 clear honey and Madera.

Now you need to leave the breasts to throughly air dry for 18 - 24 hrs or more.The best way to do this is to hang each magret on a bacon or fish hanger, like those in the photo. These are very handy for all sorts of smoking, where you need to suspend the meat rather than leaveing it on a tray (the bars leave marks and does not smoke so uniformly. If you don't have any, don't worry, bending and putting a point on some heavy gauge wire will do the job adequately. Butchers S's could also be used but only give you one holding point...which may lead to tearing.

Once the breasts are nice and dry they are ready for the smoker.

Cold Smoking the Duck 

For this recipe we want to smoke at a low temperature, we don't want the breasts going over 25°C. The lower the better, we want to avoid losing any of the precious fat. Simple enough with electric smoker with a thermostatic control but with a charcoal or wood fire it can be more difficult to keep a constant temperature. Thats why I prefer to use just a small bowl of smoldering charcoal to feed the smoker, then I only have to worry about ambient temperatures.

The magrets will need a good 12 hrs to 18 hrs of smoke, according to how smoky you like them. Low and slow is the best tempo for cold smoking, which is why it is traditionally a winter occupation in temperate climates...try cold smoking at 10°C here in the middle of summer...it ain't going to happen!!!

Once cold smoked you have two options.....

The duck can either be further smoked but this time at a higher temperature...100 - 120°C... to cook them until their internal temp hits 72°C. In this case they can be eaten hot and fresh from the smoker or cooled to room temperature then stored in the fridge for up to a week....or they could be frozen for a good couple of months without much loss of quality..esp when vacuum packed.


Above: Smoked with a honey and madera glaze (left) and plain smoked (right)

To preserve them longer and to further dry them to get to the mouthmeltingly wonderous smoky ducky heaven stage, they should be hung and air dried for a week or more. The length of time depends a lot upon the temp and humidty of the place they are dried in...preferably you want somewhere at about 10-14°C with a high relative humidty that can be reduced slowly as the breasts dry (as with dried sausage and salami making).

For this most cellars are pretty good, if truly underground, even relatively damp ones. Some use garages or even outdoors under the porch for drying but drying will take longer and may be a little uneven.

Once dried they keep for a good while...I cant say how long, they never stick around long enough or they get vacuum packed as presents. Vacuum packing will allow non refrigerated storage for at least six months to a year.

Dried Peppered Duck Breasts (Magrets Seché au Poivre)

A french classic for preserving duck breats....and mighty delicious too!

Not the recipe I am doing this weekend...as I want smoked duck breasts this time round. Nonetheless a very nice way to enjoy preserved duck and definately one to try for those who prefer their meats unsmoked, so long as they don't mind a little heat.....the pepper is very pronounced in this traditional version.

Ingredients 

12 Duck Breasts / Magrets de Canard
5 Kg Sea Salt / Gros Sel
10 Bay Leaves / Feuilles de Laurier
Herbs / Herbes de Provence
Pepper / Poivre

* Herbes...it really is up to you, I would use what I have here in large quantities from the garden..so in my case Wild Marjoram mixed with Thyme and perhaps a little Origano thrown in for good measure. If you are relying on store bought herbs, its probably best to just use the mix sold as Herbes de Provence...as its available in large quantities in supermarkets at a reasonable price.

Method

Mix the salt with the herbs and bay leaves by hand, until you obtain a uniform distribution of herbs.

Place a 2cm layer of the salt herb mix into a large glass baking tray (for smaller quantities) or the bottom of a good solid cooler box....now we're talking!

Clean the duck breasts taking care to remove any bloody bits.

Rub each breast throughly on the flesh side and sides with the salt mixture, then lay flesh side down on the bed of salt.

Repeat until the tray is full (don't overfill a shallow dish, you need space for more salt).

Once all the breast are well salted, cover with yet more salt.

Pack the salt in well around the breasts, adding more salt if needed so it just covers the surface of the fatty sides of the breasts.

Cover with a teatowel and either leave them 18 to 24 hrs in the bottom of the fridge. If using a cooler box, you can add freezer blocks over the whole caboddle and store them out of harms way. In winter a cold place, say a garage or a barn can substitute for the fridge!

Once the time is up and the breasts are nicely salt cured, take them out of the salt and rinse very throughly.

Pat dry with kitchen towels or a tea towel then set aside to let the surfaces dry a little..2 hrs should be enough.

Now take a tea towel and lay it out on a flat surface.

Grind black pepper coarsely over a good half of the tea towels surface.

Take a duck breast work some pepper into the flesh, rubbing a little to ensure a full and even distribution.

Lay the breast on the pepper covered tea towel and wrap it up so that the peppered part is in contact with the meaty side.

Once all your breasts are wrapped in individual tea towels, move them to the bottom of the fridge or other suitable cool place and leave them there for  at least 3 wks.

The breasts will be ready and can be eaten straight away after the three weeks, although they can be hung and further dried if so desired. They will keep a pretty long time, just not very long around here!

It can be a good idea to vacumm pack indiviual breast when you find that they have dried to your taste to avoid over drying.

Enjoy!

Smoking and Drying Foods for Taste and Storage

A few months ago I was asked by my friends at pigsinfrance.com to write a series of articles on Smoking and Drying Foods for the site. I agreed to start in the autumn but whilst thinking about what to cover, I came up with the idea of doing a blog, to not only accompany the articles but to actually help in the writing of them. I hope that allowing people to follow along and contribute, as I build some simple DIY Smokers, explain a few techniques and dry or smoke a wide range of different foodstuffs both for taste and storage throughout this winter, will enhance the final articles.

The blog part of the series will cover the practical aspects and some of the smoking sessions for the project. Advance warning of forthcoming smoking sessions and projects will be posted a week or so ahead of the planned date, both on this blog and on the pigsinfrance.com forum, so that any one who would like to join in has the chance to make all the preperartions. I would love to hear any feedback, observations or helpful tips, so please comment if you have something to bring to the table!

All the best

Guy

DIY Smokers Part 1 - A Cold Smoker in a Cardboard Box

OK...... so now that the nights are drawing in and the temps are starting to drop, it is the time of year to start some smoking. Its a fair while yet though before thoughts of Smoked Polish Sausages, Bacons, Gammons and other porky delights can be entertained.....my pigs are ordered for early December and mid February! I have been drying chiles and tomatos a lot over the summer...I just love sun dried cherry tomatos as a snack or to use in recipes....so I suppose I ought to start with that...but I won't...I will leave that for a few days, what we really need to get off to a flying start is some sought of smoker and a plan for next weekend!!

The most basic smoker you can probably come up with is a good old cardboard box...Ok it won't win any prizes in a craft show but one thing is for sure, it is more than capable of making a lot of cold and even some tasty hot smoked goodies!

The Cardboard Box Smoker

A smoker is after all just a chamber to allow smoke to flow over food. So long as we can provide some ventilation and keep the sawdust smouldering we can smoke food!

This may all sound a little foolhardy, after all smoke is eternally associated with flames and the idea brings to mind horrible scenarios involving barns and I don't want any lynchmobs at my door.... so a quick word of warning! Using such smokers should never be done indoors, infact smoking this way really obliges you to set up the smoker outdoors, well away from anything flammable and never when winds are to be expected! There is always going to be a small element of risk and the use of a smoker requires a regular presence throughout the session to check on and adjust temperatures, change the sawdust when it runs out and generally keep an eye on things.

With cold smoking there is little risk, the whole idea behind the technique being to keep temperatures as low and with as little difference to outside temps as possible. By heating the sawdust until it starts to smoke outside of the box on a small burner or over a fire, we have no need for a heat source in the box itself. The sawdust is introduced already smoldering, will do its job and simply just burn itself out. Cold smoking can be long process (from hours to days) and sawdust will inevitably need changing every hour or so, but don't worry, you do not need to lose any sleep, just let the smoke die down at night and light a new batch in the morning!

What you will need.........

 

A large cardboard box....the sort of thing a telly comes in would be admirable for the job but smaller boxes can also be used. Here I am using a box a speaker came in...any box that opens at the top is great for a smoker. When hot smoking though, a broader box, a seperated firebox and smoke chamber arrangement or a metal container is a much safer option.

2 dowel rods, canes or preferably steel rods...about 20 cm longer than the width of your box.

Metal grill ..one from a smallish BBQ or perhaps the shelf out of a cooker, would be ideal.

Sawdust container......old cast iron fry pans or small casseroles are great, but just about any fireproof metal recipient can be used.

Cover for the sawdust container......an aluminium pie tin or oven tray of the right size for your container, with plenty of holes pierced in it, to be placed upside down over the sawdust container. Although there is little chance of a great deal of dripping fat at low temperatures, this is essential kit for anything but true cold smoking. The cover makes it very difficult for a flame to get hold and stops any odd drips of fat from the food landing in the sawdust. Better still for hot smoking would be to have a drip tray positioned similarly to the food grill on two rods lower down in the smoker in addition to the cover.


Small sheet of metal or slab of stone.... to place in the bottom of the box ( the sawdust container sits on it).

External heat source.....can be a fire/gas burner/metal hot plate or an electrical element, if you have a proper housing for it, are all ideal for lighting your sawdust. Some people prefer to use a blowtorch to light up, but I find getting the whole container hot gets a better and more reliable smolder going. This does introduce a little heat into the smoker though, but not enough to cause any worries of overheating, so long as the ambient temperature is low and you have good airflow. Even with poor airflow the heat will dissipate into the metal/stone slab and should not cause any risk of setting light to the cardboard.


Sawdust can be had for free or next to nothing at your local sawmill, just go ask them if they have pure oak ....I paid 10€ for a cubic metre of fine oak sawdust last year....it will last me three years...LOL. The sawdust really must be a hard wood and include no resinous softwoods whatsoever, as they would give your foods a nasty resiny (inedible) flavour. Oak and beech are probably the best and easiest to get hold of over here but the fruit woods (apple, cheery, plum etc) make great smoking dusts too, if you can source them or make them yourself.

The huge advantage of sawdust over woodchips, or even shavings is that they are an awful lot more difficult to get it to hold a flame. This is exactly what we want in for safe smoking in a small space. If we were to setup an offset firebox, or have a firepit at the end of a tunnel or pipe leading to a seperate smoking area, then we could happily use chips or solid woods for smoking. For this sort of smoker I would highly recommend only using fine sawdusts.

Building the smoker.....

The box I built today is really for cold smoking only. It was made from one of two speaker boxes that have been knocking around in the cellar for a couple of years now. Whilst being too narrow to really want to risk introduing a heat source, apart from perhaps a very small gas burner or hotplate (not a camping gas type burner though as they are way too unstable) these boxes can make a great multi level cold smoker!


I started off at the top of the box, to make the grill levels for the food to be smoked. This is really simple, just poke a couple of holes through opposite walls on each side of the box. Make them about 20 cm from the top. Then cut two bits of dowel/bamboo to about 20 cm longer than the distance between the two pierced walls. These two rods will support the grill...or if you have a box like mine, then you can always add more levels, if you have enough grills! With this box I made two sets of holes for a double decker cooking area in the top half of the box and then added another set of holes about 3/4s of the way down the box to make a shelf for a drip tray.

In the above picture you can see the double decker effect. I actually cut enough holes to make it a four level affair if needs be. You could easily smoke a good couple of dozen duck breasts at once in there!


Moving down to the bottom of the box, we need to have some sort of easy access to change the sawdust and to keep an eye on things. Again a easy task..just cut a trap door with a knife, so that it opens at the bottom of the box (can be pulled down to floor level). I cut a door in both sides of the box, which can be useful to allow for a better airflow inside the box or so that you can change openings if the wind turns!

Once the trap doors are cut, we can start kitting out the base of the box. Its a pretty good idea to insulate the base a little, even if we are only cold smoking the sawdust container can get pretty hot. I had a few small tiles handy, so I lined the base of the box with them. You could equally use a bit of paving slab, a metal plate or the like. Something heavy in the bottom of the smoker is never a bad thing in any case, as it helps to keep it stable and may keep the smoker upright if an unsuspected gust of wind arrives on the scene.

Now it just remains to fill the tray with sawdust, get it lit and place it in the smoker. Don't forget that old pie mould or alu oven tray though. You will need to pierce with a generous amount of holes first, to let air through and smoke out. Placed upside down over the sawdust tray (as you can see above) no flames will be able to develop.

Other nice bits to have

Fans are handy to keep things smoldering nicely... There are a few cheapo options available here too...you could use a desk type fan outside the box, with the door open, to waft the smoke around inside the box and improve air flow. Or try placing a small hand held fan or minature desk fan inside the box..just cut another hole for the cable or simply pass it through a trap door. The enterprising may get great results by cutting an extra hole in the base of the box and installing an old 12v computer fan (the ones on powersupplies) to generate flow or to turn a hot smoker into a convection smoker! Put it on a transformer and you can adjust the air flow at will too.

Thermometers... Very much an essential tool for controlling temperature of hot smoked foods. The best setup would be to have two, one in the food and one inside the box...I use just one most of the time, both to monitor the heat in the box during the smoking (pierce the side wall with its pointy end and hang off one of the dowels) and to check on doneness. For cold smoking it is nice to have one about to check that the box isn't getting too hot, but is by no means essential.

So thats the smoker ready for some food and a good ol smoke out!! That will not be until next weekend however, when I will put it through its paces with some cold smoked duck breasts. Watch out for the recipe tomorrow....................................

All the best

Guy