Homemade Sausage Making

Canadian Bacon
Cured Pork Loin - (Ham)

2 - six pound pork loins
1 gallon ice water
6 ounces powdered dextrose
8 ounces kosher salt
8 level teaspoons (2 ounces) Prague Powder #1. (American strength 6.25% sodium
nitrite and 93.75% sodium chloride. For Polish Peklosol, the note below*

Heck, when the Canadians make something this tasty, they can call it anything they want to! Make a brine using the last four ingredients in the recipe above. If you don`t have a smoker, you may wish to add 2 teaspoons of Liquid Smoke to the brine. Trim the silverskin from the loins then inject them in several places with enough brine to equal 10% of their weight. The brine must reach the center of the meat by injection as it cannot be accomplished by mere brine-soaking within the 5-day period.
Cover the loins with the remaining solution in a non-reactive container, five days at 38°F. (3°C.)
Rinse and dry the loins, then place them into your preheated smokehouse at 135° F. and cook them without smoke three and a half hours. Slowly raise the smokehouse temperature by only three degrees every fifteen minutes for the following 3 hours while introducing hickory smoke. Finally, discontinue the smoke, but increase the smokehouse temperature by five degrees every fifteen minutes until the smokehouse temperature reaches 170°F. or until the internal meat temperature reaches 150°F. Immediately place the loins into ice water until they have cooled down to room temperature. I like to roll the Canadian Bacon "ham" in freshly cracked black pepper - lots of it. I cover the entire surface. As it is sliced, just enough pepper will fall into the frying pan to properly spice the meat for a wonderful hot roll sandwich made with just a hint of mustard put on it. Allow the Canadian Bacon to mature in the fridge overnight before serving it. It is even better after 3 or 4 days. Sliced thinly, pan fried "ham" doesn't get any better for sandwiches! In fact, yesterday my tongue slapped the daylights out of my tonsils - it was that good!

You must never attempt to smoke any meat, fish, or fowl, without curing it first with an actual cure of sodium nitrite or nitrate, depending upon the recipe. It`s also important to realize that Prague Powder cures made in the United States, are stronger than most others found in other countries. In the United States, Prague Powder # 1 contains 6.25% sodium nitrite and 93.75% sodium chloride (salt). It is also known as Instacure #1 or simply Cure #1, and is made specifically for use in smoked and cooked sausages, ham, and jerky. *Please note: In Poland, the nitrited salt cure Peklosol is available with 0.6% nitrite. Prague Powder Cure #1 in America is ten and a half times stronger than European cures.

Prague Powder # 2 in America (also known as Instacure #2) contains 6.25% sodium nitrite, 4% sodium nitrate, and 89.75 sodium chloride (salt). This formula is used for dry-cured sausages and meats where curing time allows the nitrate to gradually break down into nitrite. (It is actually nitrite that cures meat).

I hope you try this recipe for Canadian Bacon. It is really not bacon at all - but it is delicious!
Best wishes, Chuckwagon

Isn't Canadian bacon always smoked Chuckwagon? Does your recipe assume one will use liquid smoke? You don't talk about applying the smoke in the smokehouse. If the loin is cured, but not smoked it is usually rolled in corn meal (peameal bacon). In my younger days I had some pretty good peameal bacon up in Canada.

Hi Dave,
Yep, Canadian Bacon is usually smoked. Absolutely.
However, many sausage making individuals don't have access to a smoker because they live in apartments etc. where conditions prevent them from burning a bit of hickory!
These folks need a hand, and Liquid Smoke seems to be a great solution. I've used it many, many times and have found it to be a great product. There's just nothing wrong with it as is a "natural" product produced and distilled from real hickory smoke. What the heck, if you can't build a fire in your apartment, you can sprinkle a few dashes of distilled Liquid Hickory Smoke in your brine eh? Heck, I've even put it in a "spritzer" spray bottle to squirt on the slow burning hickory sawdust in my stainless steel smoker pan.
Best wishes, Chuckwagon

Adding a tablespoon of Liqid Smoke to the slow-burning hickory sawdust in a smoker will make concentrated smoke. It is great for smoking all your meats. Try spraying it on the sawdust with a "spritzer" spray bottle. It really makes thick smoke in a hurry. Great hickory taste quick!
Best wishes, Chuckwagon

I put 1/2 a loin in the brine this morning. I also added a few juniper berries and bay leaf to the brine. I will let it sit all week and into the smoker next Saturday, along with some bacon.

Dave Zac

Dave, you'll be surprised how much flavor comes from the juniper berries. We actually live in the largest juniperes forest in the world. As a child, I would reach down from the saddle and pick a few berries and try chewin' them. They were bitter and usually I would go nuts and fall off my horse and land on my head in the cactus. I recon that is what is wrong with me today!
Best wishes, Chuckwagon