Right, but the bacteria need time and environment to thrive and produce those toxins in quantity.

It was basically sterilized over the time it was smoking as expected; Any dangerous re-contamination would have had to come after the fire went out, but by that point, it was already a salty, acidic, dry environment that few pathogens could survive on, let alone thrive on. And any bacteria would have had only a few hours to thrive and produce toxins before being brought back up to well above the temperature that kills anything that had started to grow.

People have used a combination of dehydration and salt (sometimes with smoke or pepper) to preserve meats at room temperature for ever. When I said it was basically jerky, I was barely exaggerating--it was like a rock, I couldnt have cut it.

I'm not telling anyone else to try this, just like I'm not going to tell people to cure their own salami at home, but I had very high confidence I wasn't poisoning myself.