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Brazilian Style Collard Greens
Brazilian Style Collard Greens
When you think of collard greens, you think of how they are prepared down south: stewed with ham hocks or smoked turkey, cut with a little bit of vinegar. If you go further south, like South America, you will find that collard greens are sautéed with a ton of garlic. The Brazilian way is to cook them with diced bacon. This way of preparation only takes 10 minutes opposed to multiple hours of stewing. Collard greens pair great with any meat, especially feijoada.
Ingredients
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 5 strips bacon chopped
- 2 bunches collard greens washed and chopped
- 5 garlic cloves minced
- salt and pepper to taste
Instructions
- Heat up cooking oil in a large sauté pan over medium high heat. Cook the bacon until 3/4 of the way through.
- Add in the garlic and cook for 1 minute.
- Toss in the collard greens and sauté for 3-4 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.
Hickory Applewood Smoked Bacon
Tips For Smoking Bacon Pat your pork belly dry before dry rubbing. Do not skip adding the pink curing salts to the dry rub. Without them, you will just have smoked pork belly and not bacon. Store and cure the bellies in gallon sized storage …
Smoked Bone In Chicken Breasts
Smoked Bone In Chicken Breast
For how nice and juicy this chicken is, you’d think that there was a lot of work that went into preparing it. Honestly, no. This is possibly one of the lowest maintenanced things to make in a smoker. The brine is basic. If you have smaller chicken breasts under 1lb, brine them for 3 hours. If they are larger, over 1lb, they will need to brine for 4 hours. Pat them dry. Let them rest at room temp for an hour. Smoke them in a preheated 250 degree smoker until the internal temperature reaches 160 degrees. Let them rest for 15 minutes before serving.
Equipment
- Electric Smoker
- Probe Thermometer
Ingredients
- 4 split chicken breasts
Brine
- 1/2 gallon water
- 1/2 cup sea salt
- 1/2 cup brown sugar
- 8 garlic cloves minced
- 3 tbsp olive oil
- 1 tbsp dark soy sauce
- 1/2 tbsp black peppercorns
Wood Chips
- hickory wood chips
- applewood chips
Instructions
- Mix all of the brining ingredients together.
- Brine the chicken breasts in a gallon sized storage bag for 4 hours.
- Pat dry and let rest at room temp for an hour.
- Preheat your smoker to 250 degrees according to the manufacturer’s directions. Smoke the chicken breasts for 2 hours. Using a probe thermometer, monitor the internal temperature until it reaches 160 degrees.
Tips For Smoking Bone In Chicken Breasts
- If using smaller chicken breasts under 1lb, brine them for 3 hours. If they are larger, over 1lb, they will need to brine for 4 hours.
- Pat the chicken dry with paper towels and let rest at room temp for an hour. This will allow the smoke to stick to the chicken better.
- Hickory, applewood, cherrywood, oak, and alder are all great woods for smoking chicken.
- Preheat your smoker to 250 degrees.
- Using a probe thermometer to monitor the internal temperature, smoke until the chicken reaches 160 degrees in the thickest part of the breast.
- Let the chicken rest for 15 minutes before serving.
Canadian Bacon
Canadian Bacon
Making this recipe for the first time has changed my perspective of buying ham products. If you have the accessibility of smoking and time, don’t ever buy ham again. I’ve seen Canadian bacon for up to $10/lbs, which is the scam of the century. A whole boneless pork loin is only $1.99/lbs at Costco. Other than the curing salts, all the other ingredients are everyday ingredients everybody already has in their cupboards. This Canadian bacon recipe is extremely easy to make and is better than any you’ve ever tried. The salt, sugar, and curing pink salt is also a good base to start with for brining your own ham. So what is Canadian bacon really? Canadian bacon is cured and smoked pork loin. The loin is cured much the same way as a pork leg, resulting in it’s hammy goodness. The most important ingredient that you need to turn the loin into Canadian bacon is pink curing salt (aka sodium nitrite). The pink salts help prevent botulism during the curing process. Without the curing salt, you will have just smoked pork loin and not ham. The brining process takes 3 days in the refrigerator, then 1 day to dry out the pork loin.Preheat the smoker to 250 degrees. Maple, pecan, applewood, or hickory are all great woods for smoking Canadian bacon. Once heated, throw in the pork loin. The smoking temp should be maintained between 225-250 degrees. Using a probe thermometer, monitor the internal temp 90 minutes into smoking. You want the loin to have an internal temperature of 150 degrees. Once it reaches that temp, pull from the smoker and let rest for an hour before slicing.So, the biggest question left unanswered here is what do Canadians call regular bacon. In Canada, the regular smoked belly bacon that the rest of the world eats is called streaky bacon. Sounds like my northern friends smoke a lot of dope, eh?
Equipment
- Electric Smoker
Ingredients
- 4 lbs boneless pork loin roast
Canadian Bacon Brine
- 1/2 gallon water
- 1/2 cup sea salt
- 1 1/2 tbsp pink curing salt
- 1/4 cup honey or maple syrup
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 5 garlic cloves roughly chopped
- 4 bay leaves
- 1/2 tbsp thyme
- 1/2 tbsp black peppercorns
- 1 lemon juiced
Wood Chips
- maple wood chips
- pecan wood chips
Instructions
- Mix all of the brining ingredients together in a bowl.
- Add the pork loin to a gallon sized storage bag with the brine. Brine the pork loin for 3 days.
- After brining the loin, pat dry with paper towels. Let it dry on a rack on a pan in the refrigerator for 1 day.
- Preheat your smoker to 250 degrees according to the manufacturer’s directions. Place the pork loin in the smoker. Maintain a smoking temp between 225-250 degrees for 2 hours. Using a probe thermometer, monitor the temp of the pork loin 90 minutes into cooking. You want an internal temp of 150 degrees. This can take 2-2.5 hours.
- Pull the pork loin, now Canadian bacon, once it hits 150 degrees internal temp. Let rest for an hour before slicing.
Tips For Making Canadian Bacon
- Brine the pork loin for 3 days.
- You need to add the pink curing salts. If you skip adding them, you will have smoked pork loin and not the hamminess of Canadian bacon.
- Dry out the pork loin in the refrigerator for 1 day before smoking.
- Maple, pecan, applewood, and hickory are all great woods for smoking Canadian bacon.
- Maintain a smoking temp between 225-250 degrees.
- Reach an internal temperature of 150 degrees, monitoring the pork loin with a probe thermometer.
- Let rest for an hour before slicing.
