Finally everything fell into place enough that I was able to join in and try making my own bacon! Thank you for all your posts over the years -- definitely don't think I would have done this otherwise. Hot smoked on my Kamado Joe with apple wood chunks and used the Simple Bacon Recipe from amazingribs.com. Will definitely do this again -- planning to use hickory wood chunks for the next trial.
smoking away with temperature probes in each porkbelly chunk
piece one & two post smoking -- next time I'll keep the piece as big as possible to fit the fridge & smoker
pretty sure that I did not need to cut this belly in half - lesson learned!
all sliced up and ready to package up for the fridge and freezer
quality control sample 🙂