Speck

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medtran49

Master Chef
Joined
Feb 20, 2011
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Florida
I decided to use the hog jowl I was going to use to make guanciale to make German/Austrian type speck. I used juniper berries, caraway seeds, a few yellow mustard seeds, garlic powder, a small bay leaf, a bit of brown sugar, kosher salt, and a bit of pink salt. Whirled it all in the spice grinder to make a powder. The pieces will cure for about a week, turning every day, then will be washed, dried overnight in the fridge, then will be smoked over alder or beech. It started out weighing 3.7 pounds, but I cut off the skin/rind because it still had a bunch of hair in it and I didn't want to.mess with trying to get that out. Once I wash it, I'll cut off a small piece and cook.it to test for salt. If it's too salty, it will spend some time in plain water to draw out some of the salt.
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Due to Hurricanus Irma interruptus, I ended up washing as much of the cure off as I could and refreezing these a week ago Friday. We defrosted and cooked some small pieces yesterday. They were pretty salty so spent last night in a water bath. Craig just cut off another slice, cooked it up, and much better. They'll be getting smoked later on, along with some shrimp snd corn for dinner tonight. Pics to follow.
 
That's beautiful!!!! I want some! ha ha. I think my DH would really like that so it's something I ought to figure out.
 
Rendered cubes of speck on the spatzle, ready for the cheese sauce and caramelized onions. I used the rendered fat in the caramelized onions, the roux with butter, and in the spatzle dotter.
 

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+1 for the picture and description
-1 for me not receiving an invitation to dinner! ;)
 
+10
I started to run and I made it all the way to my mail box on the road.....maybe next time! Thanks!!!!!!!!!!
 
I just googled Alder chips for smoking. Wayfair, HomeHardware, Cdn Tire, Walmart, Rona... whether or not it's in stock is another matter. But Sails also carry a large inventory of chips.

Nothing is said about branches or logs.
 
I'm waiting on some Berkshire pork from a friend who raises them...alder might be a bit difficult as we are in Eastern Ontario and I never see it here..

I'm originally from the Eastern Upper Peninsula of Michigan, right on the Canadian border. We has what we considered a scrub tree, The tag alder. It grew everywhere, and is a wonderful wood for smoking fish and pork. If you have tag alder in Eastern Ontario, use it. If not, there are other great woods that should be available to you, such as sugar, or red maple, white oak, any of the birch family. Basically, you are looking for a clean burning hardwood that will produce a blue smoke.

Contrary to what many say, the wood should be bone dry to produce the right smoke. And, you can pick up hickory, mesquite, and other smoking woods in the garden/bbq section of many larger department stores, such as Walmart, target, and such. Here's a site that tells the kinds of woods used for smoking food, and where they are found. I;m sure some of them are available to you. And there are online sites where you can order wood as well.
https://www.langbbqsmokers.com/pdfs/app_woods.pdfOH, the site mentions hardware stores. And yes, you can fet oak, maple, and other woods at hardware stores. However, yo must make sure that the wood is natural, untreated wood, and, because it's been processed/finished, it's going to be more expensive.

Tip- wooden pallets are made of oak, or maple, due to the strength of the wood. They are untreated, and can often be had for free from many businesses just trying to get rid of them. You don't have to search very hard to find them. Free smoking wood, can't beat that.:mrgreen:

Seeeeeyal Chief Longwind of the North
 

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