Smoked meat

Smoking with wood

When smoking meat, hardwood or hardwood pellets are the standard choice. Softwood is avoided because its resin creates more PAHs. The smoke from the wood gives the meat flavor, aroma, and helps keep it from spoiling. There are two main smoking methods.

Cold smoking happens at temperatures under 90 degrees Fahrenheit and is better for preservation. Hot smoking takes place above 160 degrees Fahrenheit. Most wood is seasoned before use, not green. The flavor of the wood varies.

Mild options include alder, apple, apricot, ash, birch, cherry, maple, peach, and pear. Medium-flavored woods are almond, hickory, pecan, post oak, and pasania. Strong-flavored choices include acacia, black walnut, chokecherry, grapevine, and mesquite. Many other materials are also used, such as avocado, bay, beech, butternut, carrotwood, camphor, castanopsis, chestnut, citrus woods, cottonwood, crabapple, fig, guava, gum, hackberry, kiawe, lilac, madrone, mulberry, olive, peat, plum, persimmon, pimento, tea, and willow.

Types

In many African countries, nearly 80 percent of the fish caught is smoked, a task traditionally handled by women. Hot smoking is the standard method, as locals prefer its flavor. Older techniques involve bamboo racks over smoky fires, mud ovens, or placing fish directly on smoldering wood and grass. Modern approaches use repurposed oil drums, brick ovens, or Chorkor ovens.

American barbecue traces back to Native Americans, who smoked fish and game to store food for scarce periods. European settlers brought their own smoking methods from Europe and Central Asia, blending them with Native practices. Regional styles vary widely: North Carolina Piedmont features pork shoulder with a vinegar and ketchup sauce; Eastern North Carolina uses whole hog with a vinegar and pepper sauce; South Carolina opts for whole hog or shoulder with a mustard sauce.

Western Tennessee and Memphis are known for dry-rub ribs, though wet ribs are also common. Kentucky is famous for mutton, but pork shoulder and whole hog are also popular. Kansas City barbecue focuses on sauce, used with smoked pork, lamb, chicken, beef, and turkey. Texas emphasizes beef ribs, smoked sausage, and brisket.

Bacon began with petaso, a Roman ancestor of modern bacon. The word bacon may come from the Franceis word bacon, the Althochdeutsch word bahho, the Old Low Franconian word baken, or the Common Germanic word bakkon. John Harris of Calne, England, first commercialized bacon production in the 1770s. Bacon is mostly pork, sourced from the belly, back, loin, or side.

Preparation usually involves curing and smoking. Types include American side bacon (streaky), buckboard shoulder bacon, Canadian back bacon, British and Irish rasher, Australian middle bacon, Italian pancetta, Hungarian szalonna, German speck, Japanese beikon, and Slovakian oravská. Bacon can also come from beef, lamb, or wild game.