Honey Loaf Luncheon Meat

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. I thought, "Oh yeah now that sounds promising."


Important: This is NOT a regular meat loaf! It's a cured meat product in the form of a loaf to be hot-smoked then chilled & sliced for luncheon meat.

Seasonings...


...mixed with 5 Lbs ground pork


Into a loaf pan and roll some hickory smoke at hot-smoke temps (around 170°) until an I.T. of 152° is reached (about 6 - 8 hours).






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'll cut back on the sugar a bit.

Note: This question was posed by RickB Before I split & re-posted the original thread.

RickB said:

Tent, quick question. Why would you use cure #1 in something that is going to be hot smoked after mixing? Color?

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That is a great question Rick!

In fact it made me realize I needed to edit & clarify this in the post above. This is a CURED meat product, not a regular meat loaf.



It's cured with the Sodium Nitrite (Curing salt #1) for two main reasons:

1) Rick, you guessed it; yes, partly for color!

The sodium nitrite cure reacts with the Myoglobin in the meat to allow it to retain it's pink color.



But more importantly...

2) It's used to Prevent Botulism! This loaf is made from ground meat. Ground meat, when allowed to sit in the danger zone too long, has the potential for forming the Botulinum toxin. In fact the word Botulism comes from the Latin word "Botulis" meaning "Sausage", because the disease was first linked to "sausage poisoning" in Germany in 1735.

This meat is cooked at hot-smoking temps (165° - 185°) for 6 - 8 hours, and only taken to a temp of 152°. That's a long time in the danger zone and 152° is NOT high enough to denature the Botulinum Toxin, so other precautions MUST be used to prevent the possibility of Botulism.

Add to that the fact that this recipe adds honey, a common source of the Clostridium Botulinum bacteria, and you can see that the sodium nitrite is an absolute MUST for this meat product.



P.S. Ironically I am getting ready to post a thread about a curing experiment where I used Celery Juice to cure some sausages.

Thanks Cliff, your original post didnt give the cook times and I didnt make the connection with cook temps and the amount of time in the danger zone. Thanks for the update makes alot of sense now. Also what temp is needed to kill the toxin? And if you went to that temp how would that affect the texture of the meat. Im assuming it would render to much fat and make it to crumbly to slice.

Rick

TentHunter; [I said:

P.S. Ironically I am getting ready to post a thread about a curing experiment where I used Celery Juice to cure some sausages.[/I]

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So Cliff, you would use Celery Juice, instead of what? This is so dang interesting!

......................................... ZEP

RickB said:

...Also what temp is needed to kill the toxin? ...if you went to that temp... Im assuming it would render to much fat and make it to crumbly to slice.

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The toxin is denatured at temps above 176°, so yes, at that temp the fat renders out of the sausage and it tends to become dry & crumbly.

Zephyr said:

So Cliff, you would use Celery Juice, instead of what? This is so dang interesting!

......................................... ZEP

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Hang tight. It'll be explained better in the thread!



PLEASE don't anyone obsess over all this talk of Botulism. It's pretty rare and foodborne botulism is actually the rarest way to get it. It's just plain smart to use proper curing products & methods when dealing with meats that are being preserved & smoked!

I feel alittle smarter after reading this and so wanna try it!

Cliff,
You have piqued my interest in making some "sliceable" ground meat for lunches. I need to get my Rytek Kutas book out and re-read it for some ideas.

Art

Art,

This stuff is really good. It's like a cross between Old Fashioned Loaf & Honey Ham.

I modified this recipe by cutting back on the salt to 3/4 tsp per pound. That coupled with the 1 level tsp of curing salt gave me 4 3/4 tsp for the 5 pounds which was plenty.

This batch was just a tad on the sweet side for my taste. Next time I plan to eliminate the 1/4 cup of sugar and just go with the 1/2 cup of honey. It should still have a nice sweetness to it.

Otherwise the sweetness plays very well with some good spicy mustard and pickle on a sandwich!


P.S. Ironically, my wife, who doesn't care for sweet meats (maple ham/bacon), thought the sweetness was good. Go figure!