Tenderquick has been around for a very long time. My wife's parents cured their hams and bacon with it on the farm more than 50 years ago. And there are hundreds of recipes out there where folks use the stuff successfully. So if you follow a trusted recipe you should be OK.
Having said that, there are a couple of things to consider:
Cure #1 is comprised of the following ratio of ingredients:
93.75% Salt /6.25% Nitrite
MTQ is comprised of the following ingredients:
99% Salt /.5% Nitrite /.5%Nitrate
The nitrate content in the MTQ formula concerns me if you are going to use it in bacon. That is you are going to fry it after curing and smoking where there is a risk of nitrosamines. Bacon is one product where the USDA does not allow nitrates to be used. See p.28 of the USDA Inspector's Handbook
http://www.fsis.usda.gov/OPPDE/rdad/FSI ... 7620-3.pdf. Also take a look at Stan Marianski's summaries on the different cures here:
http://www.meatsandsausages.com/sausage-making/curing
Note that Stan writes that nitrates should be used only in long term cured products such as large hams.
Personally, I would use the pink salt. And hopefully our member ssorllih will chime in here since he is an expert on buckboard bacon. (He insists on calling it butt bacon!)
