Bacon curing kit questions

Air dried cured Meat Techniques

Re: Bacon curing kit questions

Postby GUS » Fri May 22, 2015 4:16 pm

Well, IF you do go for the artisan xl, then I'd plan your smoke chamber to be the size of one of those slender tool storage sheds upwards based on my first forays into the xl last summer, on the plus side it'll therefore fit plenty of bacon etc.

If truly garden outdoor based (rather than smoke vented to the outdoors) DO plan it to maximise shade, so look at the gardens shadow & seasonality, you don't want a hot box unless you are hot smoking right!? or at least semi portable to move it around till it finds a natural home.
I'm finding steel lined foam insulation cold room storage & modular building material to be pretty useful.
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Re: Bacon curing kit questions

Postby kil2k » Fri May 22, 2015 5:01 pm

GUS wrote:Well, IF you do go for the artisan xl, then I'd plan your smoke chamber to be the size of one of those slender tool storage sheds upwards based on my first forays into the xl last summer


Something like this?

Image

I'm aiming for something around half the size, so would the smaller ProQ smoke generator be more suitable?


If truly garden outdoor based (rather than smoke vented to the outdoors) DO plan it to maximise shade


The garden is South facing, but has a shaded area at the top which should be ok. If not, I'll smoke overnight during the summer :D


I'm finding steel lined foam insulation cold room storage & modular building material to be pretty useful.


Hmmm, I didn't think about insulation. The images I saw on Google when I searched for "smokehouse" didn't seem to have any. I could cover the inside with something like this and aluminum foil tape:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Thermawrap-Gene ... 620&sr=8-1
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Re: Bacon curing kit questions

Postby GUS » Fri May 22, 2015 6:50 pm

yes that size smokehouse imho would allow "mingling smoke & rapid exit"

That bubble stuff sucks ar$e from a genuine insulative standpoint, lot of smoke & mirrors where the numbers are concerned.

Better off with a foil (not paper) backed pir insulation board such as xtratherm, the thicker the better, insulation is nigh on equivilent to double the thickness in fibreglass equivilent. tried & tested, easy to cut, easy to overboard, easy to dig out "just enough" to make corrections as you go along whilst maintaining a good thermal envelope, & a squirty can to fill any gaps afterwards, or off-cuts with some aluminium tape!

It's good stuff, cheap & versatile.

The pull of the artisan for me is the easier cleaning due to size compared to the regular unit, but as per my thread it takes (ish) 3.5 times more material to fill it with unless you bend in place a restrictor (easy enough) :wink:

The other thing about the pir panels, cut some 1-2mm steel panels in place & glue them onto the backboard & you up the interior walls integrity when it comes to hanging racks off it as well as giving something for the smoke to adhere to & build up against.

OSB is good & cheap but not designed to get wet.

If you google bbq spares you'll see a plethora of thin smoke stack pipes & the like IF you find the aesthetics of plumbing type polypipe not to your liking.

Alternatively (though sweaty) a cheap option is to obtain a naff plastic garden storage box stick it upright, cut & polyweld some pre-measured polypipe internally (screwfix, t bends & straight sections) plus a few outside to shore it up against high winds & then frame around it (screws in exterior pipes).
These garden storage things are modern tat & not really fit for purpose, but can obviously frame out something with any cracked panels fixed & filled with some pir cut to shape to spread the load...

free-cycle or look out for a deal at the likes of B&Q if you want a temporary outdoor unit whilst you get up to speed..
(powerwash & bleach clean)
Sticky aluminium tape, (thermal,PIR grade @about £5 a go will seal a lot of nasty air gaps.

If the other half gives you grief about fridge space for your "product", again free-cycle is your friend!
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Re: Bacon curing kit questions

Postby kil2k » Fri May 22, 2015 8:13 pm

Awesome - thanks for the advice. I was planning to wing it, but it looks like I'm going to need to find some more supplies first! :P

One more question: do you have a thermometer in the door, and if so, is there a type you recommend? I've searched Amazon to find one suitable for outdoor use, with a probe attached, but haven't found anything that seems fit for purpose yet.
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Re: Bacon curing kit questions

Postby GUS » Mon Jun 01, 2015 4:54 pm

I've got a few bits of kit, so not the person to ask really.

There are of course different types of thermom's available.

I have a food sticking "weber" pocket probe, a professional moisture (wood species programmable) moisture & temp probe set up, a cheap lakeland oven steel thermom (with all the rare, medium, well done gubbins on for at a glance reference for the weber bbq etc) & lastly my newest & only just useable I-grill(2) ..to which I need to buy the ambient temp probe.. (the ones that come with it are for sticking in the food & leaving till alerted to pre-programmed parameters, ..also good for indoor kitchen use & "candy making" ..so will get a work out.

Fit your purchase to your "intended" use, does it need to relay to you (either via android or apple electrickery, to save you wandering out on a cold wet miserable night)!? ..or can it be a simple RF combo in which case a decent main & standalone unit by oregon scientific will probably suffice for simple measurement taking just to keep you sane from a distance.

(incidentally, I have around 10 Oregon scientific sensors & readers in use all the time, they are good work horses & worth the outlay for their longevity & spares availability / interchangeability.
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Re: Bacon curing kit questions

Postby kil2k » Mon Jun 01, 2015 7:18 pm

To be honest, my plans for this thing change from day-to-day. When I was going to build it all out of wood I was thinking to have an analogue thermometer in the door. Something like the one below:

Image

Now I've got the "non-functioning" wine cooler, I'm going to see if the digital thermometer in it still works. I've bought a 22400mAh 5v power bank with 3 x USB ports on it, a 5v computer case fan, and a couple of USB cables to strip. so I can convert the fan and digital thermometer to run off USB. The fan will be fitted into my PVC chimney to aid with smoke extraction.

At one point I was considering buying a solar panel to whack on the smokehouse roof, but not only did the missus' eyebrows raise significantly higher than normal, I remembered that the plan is to place the smoker in a shady area of the garden.

I don't think I'll feel the need to check the temperature every 5 mins, but then I didn't think I'd be opening the fridge to regularly oggle and massage my bacon either :lol:
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Re: Bacon curing kit questions

Postby GUS » Mon Jun 01, 2015 8:41 pm

If you were to add a fan make it at the first step, (air intake) & make it diallable rather than one speed to assist a draw if needed, exit deals with itself.

IF you don't know jack about solar panels stay away, (Warning: habit forming) wholly unnecessary.

Cool Ultimately depends on temp regulation & thermal difference based upon materials used within seasonal variance, which is why I say to insulate it to hell & back so it is as stable as possible within a variety of conditions / sunlight, ie reflection rather than solar absorption ..if that is achieved / planned then you can place it wherever the hell you like without too much worry.

With a cooler there is, (in essence) already a vacuum formed by means of the enclosure & seal which will assist any upward & outbound smoke when a chimney outlet is incorporated. (fag packet plans) a fan etc can easily be redundant / pointless.

The only fan I have played with was to directly assist with combustion (smoke, lots) & that was self contained run for many hours on a couple of AA's & speed switchable.
Get the basics covered without "trickin" a smoker out, as the smoke wants to escape naturally, simple's best, the rest is sealing it up tighter than a huffhaus elsewhere.
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Re: Bacon curing kit questions

Postby kil2k » Mon Jun 01, 2015 10:48 pm

The initial thoughts on the fan were because I read that if the smoke doesn't exit at the same rate it's produced, it can create a bitter flavour. The fan was only £2.32, so no great loss if it's not used!

I'm hoping to start cracking on with things tomorrow, work and weather permitting. My first port of call will be to change the fuse and see if I've got myself a 99p wine cooler. The missus has made me promise that if it works, it's staying as a wine cooler and I can find something else to use :roll:
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Re: Bacon curing kit questions

Postby GUS » Tue Jun 02, 2015 1:02 pm

From the amount I see broken on ebay they are made very poorly with bad compressors or stats, ..you may wish to check out whitegoods forum (uk based) & find out what the common faults / rmedies are before ripping its guts out.

Smoke.
It's subjective, "if a hat feels tight, get a bigger hat" that & a csg allows a scented air without a plume of smoke, nigh on naked upon exiting a vent / chimbley stack. ..chimneys are not overly complicated, with height adding to effortless improvement in the draw (as well as location), only about £6 to fit an inline restrictor in a piece of chimney pipe, which will give you some dialability in terms of retention or throughflow.

Air in the bottom, exictes the combustion chamber, then is drawn by current up & out!

Until you have first hand experience of what it kicks out over a few test burns & produce don't overplan ..you can build upon based on that knowledge thereafter.

Its not a plume, but a trickle, a large cardboard box with drier vent is how I started, there was no acridity, unless you neglected to observe clingwrapped product maturation time.

like ribs, low & slow with the smoke so it doesn't clog & choke the food pores (sic), we are going for a basic haze so the smoke can kiss it & depart,
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Re: Bacon curing kit questions

Postby GUS » Tue Jun 02, 2015 1:19 pm

The other thing you can do is simply run a smaller amount of dust through the channel (theoretically) by using a wall divider (if using the artisan) i.e. only filling it say 2/3 width, though as mentioned for the size you have got the regular unit csg will more than suffice.

Your initial thoughts will be "is that it"!? with regards to the visible exiting smoke, but the turn over (overall) will be all that is required. your wine cooler dim's are probably about the same size as my "crisp box" (about the height of a sofa back & about as wide & deep as a one seater.
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