to much cure ?

[love the smoke]

Does this recipe sound like it is using an aweful lot of cure

1 entire squared pork belly (fresh)
1 lb. un-iodized salt
1-1/2 pints of honey
2 oz. (8 level tspns.) Instacure #1


LTS

[GusRobin]

not if it is 40 lbs of meat. Normal is 1 tsp per 5lb of meat.

[Habanero Smoker]

Where did you get the recipe from? Is it a reliable source?

Once you start adding liquids to your cure, it is no longer a dry cure so the 1 teaspoon per 5 pounds is not always used. For thick liquids such as honey and maple syrup I often see it doubled; that is to compensate for the cure that is suspended in the honey, which will not come into contact with the meat. If you look at 10.5's Maple Cure recipe you will notice that. If it is a thinner liquid, such as water you will see recipes using up to 4.2 ounces of cure per gallon.

A whole slab weighs 10 - 13 pounds (you get two slabs from a pig), so that would be about 3/4 to 1 ounce of cure. The wording entire square suggest to me that it is the entire belly, and now you are looking at 20 - 26 pounds which will bring your cure up to about 2 ounces. Looking at the amounts in the rest of the recipe; it does look like it is enough to cure an entire belly. So if you have a slab of 10 - 13 pounds I would scale it down. Just as a side note; the amount of salt in this recipe looks high.

[love the smoke]

Ya I think you are spot on Habs, after looking at the recipe some more I thought it looked like an aweful lot of honey and salt for a 5 pound belly, not exactly sure where recipe came from found it in my recipe folder on the puter

Recipe in its entirety

"Bellyachin' Bacon"
(Salt Reduced)- Honey Rubbed, Dry-Cured Bacon
1 entire squared pork belly (fresh)
1 lb. un-iodized salt
1-1/2 pints of honey
2 oz. (8 level tspns.) Instacure #1
Genuine honey-cured bacon is simply not available in your grocery store and you'll have to make this bacon yourself if you'd like to have authentic honey-cured bacon. Believe me, it is the very best, and once you've tried it, you'll put an end to purchasing supermarket bacon. If you live in a city, you'll probably have to order fresh (not cured) sides from your local supermarket butcher.
Cut the (fresh) side into convenient, squared slabs that will fit inside your smoker on bacon hangers. Use a tape measure to eliminate guesswork. Keep the belly slabs COLD while you work on them.
Next, mix the cure ingredients together and rub the cure well into the fat and the flesh on both sides. Remember to use only granulated, un-iodized (kosher) salt whenever curing meat. Use heavy plastic-lined freezer paper to wrap the slab or place it into a heavy plastic food bag. Place the bacon into a cooler or a separate refrigerator at 38° F. (3°C.) for six days.
Remove the bacon, wash it very well with warm water, pat it dry, then hang it up to dry at least forty-five minutes. The bacon must be dry to the touch before it will take on any smoke. Preheat your smokehouse to 140° F. (60° C.) and smoke the slab using dampened hickory sawdust until the internal meat temperature reaches 130° F. (54° C.). This will take hours, so be patient. Reduce the smokehouse temperature to 120° F. (49° C.) and continue smoking the bacon until a desired golden color is obtained.
If you choose to remove the rind, wait until the bacon has cooked and is just out of the oven. Use a knife with a longer blade, placing it beneath the subcutaneous fat above the lean meat. You'll find the task much easier while the fat remains hot. Finally, hang the slab inside a cooler at 38° F. (3°C.) for eight hours before slicing it thick as your hat! This is the best bacon you have probably tasted anywhere in your entire lifetime! Be careful that your tongue doesn't slap the daylights out of your lips! It's so simple to prepare, you may cook it for breakfast every single day, if you don't mind having more cholesterol than a heart surgeon's medical manual! Our outfit cooks this stuff a couple of times per week, and always on Sunday mornings, for a special treat with poached eggs.
A black iron skillet is ideal for frying bacon although bacon may burn in the blink of an eye inside any utensil. If you prefer crispy bacon, use medium heat, thinner slices, and pour off the fat as it accumulates in the skillet. Many folks drain bacon on paper towels, reserving the rendered fat for highly prized cooking oil full of flavor. Check with your cardiologist, then pour it through a fine sieve into a glass container. Cover and store it inside a refrigerator or freezer for future use. Older bacon will cook and burn almost twice as quickly as fresh bacon. For perfectly crisp, evenly-cooked bacon with no hassle, do what professional chefs do... bake it! Preheat the oven to 400˚F., lay out slices in a pre-heated black skillet or lipped baking sheet, and bake it until it's fat begins to render in five or six minutes. Bacon strips are cooked more consistently in an oven and when part of the bacon is done, all of it is done – without raw or burnt spots.
Best Wishes,
Chuckwagon

[love the smoke]

going to try it on some of this





50 pounds worth

[love the smoke]

Ok still need a little help here, math was never my strong suit

How do I figure out how much salt,honey,cure ect I need per pound of pork

I weighed some of my bellies and they weigh anywhere from 3-5 pounds

Thanks alot

LTS

[Habanero Smoker]

Wow; that's a lot of bacon!!!!

I won't be on line tomorrow, on for a short time on Monday, then will not be signing back on until Thursday. So I hope I have given you enough information in this post.

In this case you don't have to be exact, just accurate, with this amount of cure you will remain within safe limits. Again using 10.5's Maple Cured Bacon, that recipe will cure 3 - 5 pound slab. I would use that recipe as a base for every 5 pound, but instead of using the maple syrup and brown sugar, use 1/2 cup of honey. The salt amount in the recipe you posted looks like about twice as much as needed. I would also use the salt amount listed in the Maple Cured recipe; but I like to use pickling salt, because it works better in cures; it dissolves easier.

You have 50 pounds, and I believe I counted 10 slabs, so you can multiply the Maple Cure recipe by 10, thoroughly mix up a batch and divide it evenly between each slab. But you may not be able to mix that large of a batch thoroughly enough, unless you have a good mixer. Another thought would be to make five double batches of the Maple Cure, and then divide that between two of the belly pieces.

If you stack the bellies while they are curing, besides flipping you need to rotate the bellies each day so that the same belly is not always on the bottom.

[oakville smoker]

OMG    Just cruising the board seeing what I might have missed and see these pics of bellies
EXCITED ??????
Like a boy seeing a girl in the right light for the first time
I hope it all turned out well

be still my rapidly beating heart