Venison Bacon

This year after you fill your tag and thinking of what to do with all the venison you harvested, you will have all your roast and steaks of course but what to do with all of the trimmings?
Don't just go to the old standby of summer sausage and jerky, but try Venison Bacon.

Now a typical Whitetail doesn't have the belly meat to make traditional bacon or the fat levels either, so we are going to make a ground and pressed bacon from trimmings
I get my seasoning from Curleys Sausage kitchen http://curleyssausagekitchen.com/venison-bacon.html

After it is smoked, refrigerated overnight, and sliced I put it up in Vacuum sealed bags before freezing.
It would last a year or more but once you taste it I doubt it will ever sit in your freezer that long.

I take a package out the night before to defrost in the fridge then fry it up in a pan or bake in the oven as I would for regular pork bacon. This recipe produces very little dripping and never had it spatter while pan frying.

He has a small batch kit (for 10lbs of meat) up to 100lb and a very reasonable price too.
here is the recipe for his most popular 25lb batch

Bacon Ground and Formed Recipe 

25# Batch Mix with (25 lbs. pork) or (15 lbs. pork and 10 lbs. beef) or (12½ lbs. pork and 12 ½ lbs. beef) or (13#Venison and 12# pork)
1 bag Bacon Ground and Formed Unit .84#
1 oz. Sure Cure .06
4 cups (2#) cold Water

Procedure:

*Grind Pork or Beef once through 1/8th plate.
*Place in mixing pan or meat mixer
*Add seasoning water and cue and mix for 10 minutes. Meat will turn a dark cured color and get real tacky (sticky) Mixing of meat is very important.
*Lay mixture in a shallow pan with a piece of plastic in it. This helps the meat not to stick to pan when it is cured. Form into a 2 in. thick loaf. Use hands to push down on meat to make a firm texture. Cover with plastic and put in refrigerator overnight.

Smoking:

*Carefully turn pan upside down on smokehouse screens so meat falls out of pan.
*Set smokehouse temp at 130-140 degrees for 1 to 2 hours or until dry, meat needs to dry before smoking - damper open.
*Set smokehouse temp to 150-160 degrees - damper 1/2 open - smoke 2-3 hours or until desired color. Usually 2 pans of sawdust or chips.
*Set smokehouse temp 170-180 degrees - no smoke – cook until internal temp is 150 degrees. Dampers closed. Also see steam cooking. This cuts cook time in half.
*Refrigerate overnight. Slice, package and freeze.
**5 lb. Batch--.17 lbs. seasoning, sure cure - one level teaspoon (the pink stuff) and 3/4 cup water.
**Seasoning Storage: To keep seasonings fresh and prevent caking, store in refrigerator or freezer.

Happy Hunting