Smoke House Meat

[cowboy43]

As a young child I remember smoking meat, but I was to young to remember how it was done. I remember a small shed with meat (hog) hanging and curing. What I don't remember is how long it was smoked, how the smoke was made . I do remember the she'd was not hot, it was just smoke.

 

[Kingfisher]

And your question is? Sounds like a sweet memory to me! How did it taste?

 

[Jogeephus]

Once a piece of meat is cured the smoke time is irrelevant. A cold smoke was used for preservation reasons to keep bugs and things away. Some people kept meat in the smokehouse year round. Small fires were built whenever they wanted to smoke up the house and keep the critters at bay.

 

[lavacarancher]

Jogee is right on. You can use two methods. One is cold smoke where the temperature is maintained below 140 degrees for several hours (>24 hours). This method is usually done in the dead of winter where the ambient temperature is at or near freezing. The meat is first dehydrated by packing the fresh hams, bacon, etc in salt (some use sugar) for a couple of days then the salt is removed and the meat hung in the smoke house where a small fire is smoldering for a couple of days. You can enhance the amount of smoke by placing green wood chip on the coals. This is the method my grandfather and my dad used for many years. The hams would hang in the smoke house all year after curing or until all eaten. You would have to trim the "green" stuff growing on the outside of the ham before cooking it but it was always delicious.

The other method is hot smoking where the temperature is maintained at or near 165 degrees. I don't try to cure or smoke hams or any other part of the animal today, I only do sausage. The hot smoke method can be done any time of the year because you're not trying to keep the meat from spoiling. At 165 you are actually cooking the meat and it takes on the flavor of the smoke in the process.

Both methods should use meat cure such as sodium or potassium nitrate but most surely the cold smoke method since the temperature is just slightly under the point where bacteria will start growing.

My smoke house looks like an outdoor toilet. It is 4X4X8 feet, well insulated with the incoming and outgoing air controlled. This is the way I control the temperature.

 

[Rafter S]

We had a smokehouse attached to the wash house (separate rooms in the same building). The smokehouse portion was about 4' wide, and probably about 12' long. My father smoked mostly sausage, but occasionally ham and bacon. Some of the sausage would only be smoked for a couple of days to give it the smoke flavor, then taken down and put in the freezer. The rest was left hanging until pretty much all the moisture was removed, as was eaten "as is". We called this "dry sausage". He had some poles that were just the right length to lay across the plates at the top of the wall studs, about 7' off the floor, to hang the meat on. When first hanging the sausage he'd make sure none of them were touching each other. I think he said they'd mold if touching.

For the method, he had a metal 5-gallon bucket that he would build the fire in. He'd put it in the middle of the room (which had a concrete floor), and after the fire was going to his satisfaction he'd put a lid on it to restrict the oxygen and make it smoke instead of flame. This lid was a thin metal plate with one or two holes in it. His preferred fuel was hickory nuts, but if he didn't have any he'd use hickory, pecan, or oak wood.

I also remember that if the weather was warm he'd make sure to keep a lot of smoke going; he said this kept the meat from spoiling. If the weather was cool he wouldn't worry about it as much.

I'm sure there are a lot of other details that I don't remember. This was over 30 years ago.

 

[Jogeephus]

Around here they would have community hog killings where everyone would get together and do their hogs. This might take a week or more then the meat was packed in salt to cure and some sausages were made and stuffed in barrels of lard for preservation. Most families had their own smokehouses behind their homes and this is where most of their year's meat supply was stored. Thieves would sometimes break into these buildings and steal the meat. To fix this, some people took a guinea sac needle and stitched a cord through a rattlesnake and tied it to a peg driven in the center of the smokehouse floor which was normally dirt. I am told this was more effective than rock salt at keeping thieves at bay.

 

[jltrent]

Just don't try to smoke em while in the smoke house. Cause if your smoke house gets on fire you may have to grab your meat an beat it.

 

[lavacarancher]

Just don't try to smoke em while in the smoke house. Cause if your smoke house gets on fire you may have to grab your meat an beat it.

Could be but that's the difference between fish and meat, you can't beat your fish. So don't smoke fish in your smoke house.

 

[cowgirl8]

As a young child I remember smoking meat, but I was to young to remember how it was done. I remember a small shed with meat (hog) hanging and curing. What I don't remember is how long it was smoked, how the smoke was made . I do remember the she'd was not hot, it was just smoke.

I guarantee there are hundreds of demos on youtube for smoking meats. Some with tours through smoke houses, step by step procedures. I just searched smoke houses and yep, endless...

 

[Fire Sweep Ranch]

OK, I thought the title said "Smoke Horse Meat",...... not sure why!

 

[hurleyjd]

Any one living on the farm years ago always had a few hogs, a flock of chickens, a milk cow and the garden. All of these activities furnished food for the family. Chores were a daily event to take care of the animals that furnished you most of your nourishment. My Dad never smoked any meat it was always salt cured. A ham would come in the house and there would be skippers in the hard part of the outside of the ham. These were cut out and the ham was boiled for at least a half of day and then still pretty salty. Only time pork was eaten was in the winter. Chicken was always the family meal. Milk, butter and butter milk were standard fare on the dairy side. Beef was very scarce in our house, steak every now and then always round steak chicken fried. The meat market at the grocery was nearly non existent. This was subsistence farming at its best and every one did it. And most had a little money coming in from some side business outside of the farm. We now think that we can survive by our wits and talents and lot of us would come up short in this department including me.

 

[Caustic Burno]

Once a piece of meat is cured the smoke time is irrelevant. A cold smoke was used for preservation reasons to keep bugs and things away. Some people kept meat in the smokehouse year round. Small fires were built whenever they wanted to smoke up the house and keep the critters at bay.

My grandparent's did had a row of churn's in the smoke house as well.
They were filled with sausage, they were then filled to over the sausage with
hog lard. Hams and slab bacon were just hanging.
The smoke box was outside the smoke house and a stove pipe ran in trench
to the middle of the smoke house.