Brining and Freezing Thoughts

[KY Smoke]

Question for everyone....especially Tony (DM) because I'm using your pork brine.  Prepping the thick cut pork chops and have a total of 10 of them that will end up being stuffed with a modified version of SuperDave's sausage stuffing.  I'm going to do 4 this weekend to do a dry run.  But the other 6 need to be prepped on Tuesday, for a Birthday Luncheon at my wife's office on Wednesday.  My question is, will it be ok to brine all 10 of them tonight or tomorrow morning, and then freeze the other six until Monday night/Tuesday morning?  I don't want to take a chance on leaving them in the fridge that many days, but would like to brine all at once if possible.  Still farely new to brining, so looking for all of your advice.

Looking forward to your help.

Thanks.....Jeff

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[DivotMaker]

Jeff, I would brine all at once (about 3 hours is plenty for those), then immediately vacuum pack the ones you are freezing, and get them in there.  When you thaw them in the fridge for a couple of days (before use, of course), make sure you rinse them well before rubbing and smoking.  Always, always, always thoroughly rinse brine from the surface of meat, unless you like it really salty!

p.s., Since you started a new thread, and asked the question, I removed the duplicate post in the brine recipe.  We try to keep the discussion to one place or the other, and avoid asking the same question in different places.  No worries!

[KY Smoke]

Thanks Tony, but wait to rinse the chops when I thaw them?  Was going to rinse them before I packed and froze them.  I did actually think about not rinsing them to let the brine freeze into them though, but then thought maybe it would have been too much.  So from your recommendation..... .....I'm going to wait and rinse them after I thaw them on Tuesday. 

As always, thanks for your help Tony!

Will post the rest of the process, including the stuffing and tying process, throughout the day tomorrow. 

[DivotMaker]

Jeff, you're probably right to rinse first, but I'm not sure it matters.  There won't be much penetrating going on when the meat is frozen, I wouldn't think.

[KY Smoke]

Also, sorry about the duplicate post.  I decided that this maybe needed a separate topic, since freezing was involved.  I meant to go back and delete the one in the brine recipe, but......trying to do too much at once I guess.  Thanks for having my back. 

[DivotMaker]

No problem, Jeff!  It's what I do.

[SuperDave]

I would not have brined the meat prior to freezing.  I would worry that freezing and expansion of the brine in the muscle fibers would play havoc with the meat texture.

[Walt]

After I make a large SAMS run, i brine, rub, inject (whatever is needed for each particular piece of meat) then vac seal & freeze. All my work is done up front. When ready to cook, i remove a couple days before the cook & put in fridge for a slow thaw. It has not impacted the meat in a negative way @ all. It does make for a very long day of shopping & prepping but on the plus side, it sure is nice to slice the vac bag & place directly in the smoker.

[DivotMaker]

After I make a large SAMS run, i brine, rub, inject (whatever is needed for each particular piece of meat) then vac seal & freeze. All my work is done up front. When ready to cook, i remove a couple days before the cook & put in fridge for a slow thaw. It has not impacted the meat in a negative way @ all. It does make for a very long day of shopping & prepping but on the plus side, it sure is nice to slice the vac bag & place directly in the smoker.

+1.  Me too, Walt!

[Libohunden]

Once I had picked up a 2 pack of butts from SAMs but only smoked 1 butt. While preparing my brine for the one I was smoking, but decided to pour some brine into the vac bag on the one I was freezing.  My thought was that it would only penetrate for a couple of hours until the outer layers froze.  But would restart brining upon thawing so that I could just open, rinse and throw in smoker.  Seemed to work okay.  However, I forgot to rinse so I'll probably give it another shot someday.

[gregbooras]

Good info here, I would have never thought to brine/inject and then freeze!

In my pork and brisket I use #1 cure, is this not affected when thawing out for a few days?

Thanks Greg