I just have to share with you this recipe I just made up.  This is only my second attempt at this and am sure there are a lot of things that could be done differently to make it even better, but this didn’t turn out too bad.

3 pounds of ground venison (I’m sure Elk, antelope or any other wild game would work as well)

3 pounds of ground pork (88/12%)

2 TBL Mortons Tenderquick Salt

3 TBL Liquid Smoke

1/2 cup Maple Flavored Pancake Syrup

1 1/2 cups water

Mix very well!  It turns into a very sticky mess of meat, but trust me it will be worth the effort.  When you think it’s mixed well enough…well…mix it some more.

Put the whole batch into a wax paper lined pan 13X9X2 and press it down good to get out the air bubbles, cover with a Saran Wrap plastic and put it in the fridge for 24 hours (this lets the nitrites in the salt kill all the bugs in the meat).

After the 24 hours, dump the mix out onto a smoker wire rack and put in the smoker at 140 degrees for 3 hours.  This will dry out the mix pretty good and get it ready for smoke.

Add a handful of wood chips to the smoke pan and smoke at 155 degrees for 2 hours.  Don’t add any more chips than the handful, a little smoke goes a long ways.

Increase the smoker temp to 180 and let go for 2 more hours or until the internal temp of the meat mix reaches 155 degrees.  Now take it out of the smoker and put it in the fridge to cool.

When cool, slice it up in bacon thick pieces for frying.  Fry like any other meat.  You are going to love this stuff!

Bears Butt

November 28, 2013 (Happy Thanksgiving)!!!!

I’m adding this message to help you make perhaps a better recipe.

The above recipe produced a very dry bacon, with very little flavor.  So for my next batch, I increased the amount of Maple Syrup to one full cup, everything else remained the same.  The outcome was a very dry bacon that was too sweet for this guys fancy.  I decided at that point I needed to add more fat to the mix.

After a couple of weeks, I went to the store and bought a two pound package of suite.  Suite is plain old ground up fat, either from beef or pork.  The butcher told me my suite was mostly pork, but he added a bit of beef fat to it and that it would not make any difference to my recipe…we will see.

So, I want a 80/20 mix of meat in my final mix to make my bacon from.

I have 3 pounds of 88/12 ground pork and am adding 3 pounds of 100% ground venison…no fat…I did a quick calculation and came up with 14 ounces of suite should be added to my mix to give me the 80/20 I desire…so, again in my mind, why not just make it an even 16 ounces and be done with it…so that is what I did.

Thinking back to the previous recipes (batches of bacon), batch one was a bit salty for both me and Sherry, and so I backed off from 3 TBL to 2 TBL of the Mortons Tender Quick salt.  Because I want this batch (number 4) to taste a bit more salty, I increased the amount of salt back to 3 TBL.  WHY?  Because of the suite I’m adding.  I think it will absorb some of the saltiness and will disperse when cooked…just my way of thinking.

I also took out all of the maple syrup.  For me, it makes sense to take it out as a half cup didn’t add anything to the final result (my taste buds could not taste it), while a full cup was over the top for both Sherry and me.  So, for now…take it out!

Of course it has sat in the cooler for 24 hours and is now in the drying stage of the smoker.  Two hours at 160 today, as it is cold outside and then I’ll add some apple chips for smoke and increase the temp to 170 for a couple of hours and then will probably have to increase it to 180 until the internal temp reaches the 160 degree mark.

I will add the results of this batch 4 tomorrow when I have had a chance to taste test it!  How close do you think I am to a good recipe for venison bacon?

Bears Butt

December 22, 2013