I've been working on my freezers. I've got to get them all sorted, get unfinished projects finished, and organize the meat. When we butcher an animal, we try to use every part of the animal. Sometimes it just takes some time to get to it.
These hocks are one of those unfinished projects. These are from the boar hog we butchered last spring. They've been in the freezer waiting for me to cure and smoke them.
First the cure...which is equal parts of brown sugar and salt, with some seasonings in, and some pink salt.
I apply the cure liberally to all pieces....then cover and refrigerate until they are cured...
About 3 weeks later they look like this...
They are ready to be rinsed. Twice...and then they look like this...
And now their ready for the smoker. Smoked for a few hours and they look like this...
We've done all this in preparation for bean week. Bean week is when I can all the beans that we'll use through the next year. Each of these hamhocks will season a whole pot of beans.
And we made a new discovery today. Lemondrop Melon.
It looks a bit cantaloupe-ish, but the flavor is totally different.
The flavor is like a watermelon lemonade.
I highly recommend trying one....we even kept some seeds just to see if we can grow one.
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