Thursday, July 30, 2015

How do you make Venison Bacon?


Dave from Elkridge, MD asked:

How do you make venison bacon? Any good procedures? Is it ground venison, pork shoulder and buck board bacon cure - pressed into a mold?

Thanks!



Hello Dave and thanks for the question.

Yes, you are correct. Venison bacon is made in the same fashion as turkey bacon, the meat can be ground to a couple different textures or plate sizes if you would like and mixed very well to extract as much protein as possible so the product binds together tightly when you press it into the pans.

There are three very important, key processing points that must be done properly to make the product work.

- I like to grind about 3/4 of the meat through the fine grinding plate twice and the other 1/4 through the coarse sausage plate to provide some larger pieces of meat for texture when eating the final product.

- Mixing: After the product is ground you will need to mix for a solid 5 minutes very vigorously to get as much protein extraction as possible. You want that meat batch to be as sticky as possible.

- Spray your pans with a non-stick spray and pack the meat in tightly with no air pockets.

During the grinding process, it's important to add your seasoning and non fat dry milk to the product as a binder, or if you can find it: sodium tripoly phosphate works very well. If you enjoy making these type of products, getting my Mastering Marination DVD would be a wise choice. In that DVD, we make a variety of product similar to restructured Bacon as well, I think you would really enjoy it.

Thanks and good luck with the product.

Brad Lockwood