Beef belly

[DaveD]

Hey folks, when doing my most recent online meat order, from Porter Road this time and the last order until the hottest part of the northern summer subsides, I came across beef belly, which I hadn't heard of before. PR is the one place I know of to get pigsket (the brisket analog on a pig), so why not have beef belly, the pork belly equivalent on a steer? They were having a sale, so it was an impulse buy, and it'll be tomorrow's cooking experiment. With the sale factored in, the price came out to just over $8/lb, not outrageous at all.

There's a bit out there on cooking one of these, the majority of which are to make burnt ends. I know I may be ostracized for saying it, but I'm just not a huge fan of burnt ends - way too sweet for me. My sweet tooth has really declined as I get older, I'm a savory kinda guy all the way anymore. But Jeremy Yoder over at Mad Scientist has a vid where he smoked one in the usual way, low and slow using the whole cut, and that's my plan as well. I *might* cut it in half (errrr, sorry klflowers, I mean cleave it in twain) to enable a seasoning comparison (and those two additional barky surfaces), e.g. SPG vs a proper beef rub. TBD on that one.

Here it is thawed and salted, ready for tomorrow; it weighs in at a shade over 4lb/1.9kg. I'll run it on the SnS kettle with B&B charcoal and mesquite chunks most of the way, and if need be, move it into the Pit Boss in a foil boat to finish and rest (I'll need the kitchen oven for sides). Some serious marbling in this puppy! Jeremy's taste test indicates that it's very rich from all the rendered fat, so it won't be huge portions I reckon...




More tomorrow morning!

[STEbbq]

I will be interested (as always!) in your results and thoughts. I bought the same cut specifically for making pastrami as I understand the NYC delis use it instead of brisket. I have not tried it yet.

Maybe it would be good in tacos like we see with pork belly tacos?

[DaveD]

I'll bet it would make for KILLER tacos! Great idea as one of the leftover uses...

[Draznnl]

Good luck. Greatly anticipating your report. Looking at that hunk o’ meat with all the marbling, my mind immediately turned to pastrami. I bet it would be great.

[DaveD]

Alas, I really don't much care for pastrami & corned beef. Bacon is about the only cured meat I'm into, come to think of it...

[Draznnl]

Ah well, you can’t win ‘em all. I’m with you on burnt ends being too sweet DaveD but I can’t understand how anyone doesn’t like pastrami. 🤪🤪😵💫

[DaveD]

Yeah, I get that a lot

[Bad Hat BBQ]

Looks good
Very interested in how this goes and hearing you thoughts

[Jerod Broussard]

I always wanted to cook navel to see if the animal was an innie or outie.

[fzxdoc]

That animal is well beyond picking its belly button lint. Just saying.

[Jerod Broussard]

fzxdoc do ya think people give up picking bellybutton lint for lent?

[FireMan]

Good time to lent them a hand.

[mrichie1229]

My mouth is watering already!

[Spinaker]

I have been meaning to order one of these for a long time. I hear the beef bacon you can make with this is incredible.

You could also just smoke it as is. I am sure that would be fantastic!

[DaveD]

That's the plan, smoke as is. Leaning more toward cleaving it in twain now though... then I can compare seasoning profiles too

[klflowers]

I would also say cleave it in two

[SheilaAnn]

At my old job, we made beef bacon often. Delicious!

[realdocBBQ]

I am really interested in this...

I had one on order a couple of weeks back, but after it had been like 7 or 8 days with no indication of shipping or anything, I contacted them and canceled. They emailed me back and said they were about to ship my order (the following Monday, another 3 or 4 days I think) and I decided to pass. Just didn't have a good feeling about them. Was supposed to be a 7 or 8lb beef navel.

I'm definitely going to have to try again with someone, though.

My plan is beef bacon and pastrami.

[DaveD]

I've had nothing but excellent experiences with Porter Road, fwiw. Have ordered from them a fair few times, and the only glitch was getting the wrong cut one time, and they immediately credited back the price diff. Can't wait to get this thang in the kettle tomorrow!

[Zman23]

I have one in my freezer. Been thinking beef bacon. But then you got me thinking burnt ends, then you got me thinking tacos. May need to order more. And to get flat rate shipping I'll have to order other stuff...

[DaveD]

The struggle is real.

[Bkhuna]

I'm almost always thinking of tacos.

[johnec00]

I've gotten beef navel from Agridime Store several times. They offer grain or grass fed in prime, choice or select, although they don't always have all the grades in stock.

It makes pastrami that's very tasty, but somewhat fattier than other pastrami cuts. This is prime.




Made into beef bacon its real good as the fat renders out during frying. This is select.

[DaveD]

That looks great!!

[fzxdoc]

Win-win.

K.

[DaveD]

Gooooooooood morning Pitmaestros! Another beautiful late-late-spring day here in NoVA, except for another round of high-altitude Canadian smoke filtering the sunlight. Morning temps in the low 60sF/mid-teensC on their way to a forecast high of 82F/28C with barely noticeable humidity, dew points around 50F/10C. Doesn't get much better than this. We sure could use some rain though, we're in no-kidding drought conditions these days.

I did go ahead and cleave the belly in twain, and seasoned up one piece with POG and the other with Henrik Hank's Bona Fide (salt free, having dry brined already). Took a bit more fiddling than usual to get the temp stable at about 225F/107C, looks like it wants to settle down at about 235F/113C, which is just fine by me.

More later!



No trouble telling these two apart!

Mesquite chunks on B&B charcoal.

After an hour, next check after lunch sometime...

The temperature story so far.

[fzxdoc]

This is going to be fun to watch, Dave.

Kathryn

[Johnny Booth]

I’m with you on the burnt ends, too sweet at most restaurants.
When we make them, we fry them in their own fat, then deglaze and re-hydrate them with a very thin mix of bbq sauce and low sodium beef broth. Cuts the sweetness way down.

That belly looks fantastic. 👍😎