Honey Loaf Luncheon Meat (and a bacon teaser)

[TentHunteR]

I saw a recipe in the Rytek Kutas book for "Honey Loaf," which is a all pork variation on the "Old Fashioned Dutch Loaf" I made about a month ago.

Oh yeah now that sounds pretty tasty, but first, a little bacon teaser...

We're almost out of bacon again, so here's 9 pounds of my "Cider Mill" cured bacon (and a ham shank bone) getting some apple smoke on the MAK with the A-Maze-N Tube smoker.


Now here's the real teaser: I have 6 pounds of pork belly & ham Shank being cured for a German bacon called Schinkenspeck. More about that later this week. 






Now, onto the Honey Loaf.

Seasonings...


...mixed with 5 Lbs ground pork


Rolling some hickory smoke at hot-smoke temps (around 170°) until an I.T. of 152° is reached.


Ready to go into the fridge to chill overnight before slicing.




Just under 5 pounds of lunch meat ready for packaging & freezing.



This stuff is DELICIOUS!  The honey flavor comes though nicely with the mild savory seasonings. A few slices on some wheat bread with a little spicy mustard & pickle sure made a great sandwich!




Note to self: Next time I will cut back on the sugar a bit.

[muebe]

Looks great Cliff!

I gotta make some more meat loaf

[ACW3]

Looks good, Cliff!! 

Art

[mikecorn.1]

That looks great! 1 Sammie to go for me


Sent from my iPhone 5 using Tapatalk

[Keymaster]

Mmmm, I shinkenspeck that looks Delicious My last name is Bachman, people tell me thats German

[teesquare]

Cliff - how much would you reduce the sugar in this recipe? Looks great!

[squirtthecat]

Yeah, baby!

[bbqchef]

One of my favorites... meatloaf with mushroom gravy or just as a sandwich!

[fishingbouchman]

Looks good. I could eat some of that for lunches today.

[TentHunteR]

Cliff - how much would you reduce the sugar in this recipe? Looks great!

 
I'm actually debating that very question. 

Don't get me wrong, this batch is absolutely delicious and will definitely NOT go to waste. And I have to say the sweetness plays well with the addition of Pickle & mustard on a sandwich. But with the addition of the honey, it's just a tad sweet for my taste.

I used a 1/4 cup sugar, the same amount used in the Old Fashioned Dutch Loaf (which turned out perfect).  So, I'm thinking next time I'll try eliminating the sugar altogether and just go with the 1/2 cup of honey.  That's still approximately twice the amount of sugar as the Dutch Loaf, so it should still have a good level of sweetness, focusing more on the honey flavor.


It's all just part of the process of testing, modifying, testing again, until you get it right. BUT heck, when you can make really great tasting lunch meat for sammies for under $3/lb, the testing is well worth it! 

Cliff



P.S. Ironically, my wife who doesn't care for sweet meats (ham bacon, etc.) thinks it's fine. Go figure! 

[TentHunteR]

I gotta make some more meat loaf

I want  bring this up NOT to pick on Muebe, but as a point of clarification (because of a question asked on another forum).

Please understand that this is NOT a traditional meat loaf. Rather it's a cured sausage in the form of a loaf and is intended to be hot-smoked to a temp of 152°, then chilled & sliced to be used as luncheon meat. This is why it uses the sodium nitrite cure.

Could you cook and eat it hot? Sure you could, and it might be pretty dang tasty that way, but you'd want to cook it to a minimum temp of 165° if you do.  But this is only cooked to an internal temp of 152°, which is why it MUST be cured using a sodium nitrite cure.

Sorry if this post cause any confusion! 

Cliff

[Pappymn]

Tent that looks really good.  I like to see ethnic traditions being carried on. I'm thinking rye bread and the mustard and the pickle would be killer....maybe toasted.

[teesquare]

Thanks for the additional info Cliff!I make a 2- grain beer mustard that  would go nice with this!

T

[TentHunteR]

I make a 2- grain beer mustard that  would go nice with this!

T

Uhm... YUM!  Where would one find this recipe?