As the title said I just won some free pork belly from the butcher. Anyone got a decent recipe and smoking process they can recommend?
As the title said I just won some free pork belly from the butcher. Anyone got a decent recipe and smoking process they can recommend?
I got you covered. This is a recipe I use all the time. I don’t really change up the curing steps too much, since the meat really doesn’t take flavor from it. Rather, all the flavor is in any glazes or rubs you’d use during and after smoking.
The recipe is similar to baker’s ratios, using the weight of the meat as the base. Per kilogram of pork belly, use 2.2% salt, 1.5% brown sugar and 0.32% Prague Powder #1 (6% sodium nitrite). Be careful not to use too much Prague powder, it gets toxic in high concentrations. More than a tablespoon in 5lbs of meat is too much.
For 1000g meat, you’d use 22g salt, 15g brown sugar and 3.2g Prague Powder. Scale up or down to the weight of your slabs by multiplying their mass in grams by the percentages. A digital kitchen scale that measures in grams makes this step pretty much foolproof.
Blend the powders and rub it all of it onto all sides of the slab. If you have a food sealer, vaccuum seal the slab and any extra loose powder from the bowl or your work surface into the bag and seal it up. If you’re using ziplock style freezer bags, you can displace the air by submerging the bag into a tub or large bowl of cool water, venting it through the zipper. Make sure to get out as much air as you can or the fat can go rancid.
Refrigerate the meat 7 to 10 days, turning over daily and massaging the surface of the sealed bag to redistribute liquids. Don’t open the bags until the meat is cured.
After 7 to 10 days, the meat should be dark pink and firm. Remove the meat from the bag and rinse in cool water. If you prefer less salty bacon, you can soak it in cool water for several hours to overnight.
Blot the surface dry and return to the refrigerator uncovered on a rack over a rimmed sheet pan for 8 to 24 hours to develop a pellicle. It will feel waxy and slightly tacky to the touch. 24 to 48 hours is fine.
Now youre ready to smoke, and here’s where you can start to riff on recipes. I just smoke in an elecrric smoker over hickory chips at 74°C (165°F) for about 4 hours, or until a probe registers 61°C (141°F) at the thickest part. I’ll share some recipes in a follow up comment.
Return to the fridge to cool thoroughly before slicing. I use a deli slicer, and have found 3mm thick is a good compromise between crispy and chewy bacon, when cooked.
I mentioned recipes. Normally I just smoke over hickory chips in an electric, but sometimes I use hickory chunks in the kamado. I don’t find the final product to be better enough to bother with the kamado unless I’m doing a big batch, or I have other things I’ll want to smoke later.
Apple wood is good to sub in for, or mix with hickory.
If you like maple bacon, maple wood gives a nice light hint of flavor that doesn’t overpower. You could also mix maple syrup with a little warm water and baste the meat with that periodically after the first half hour of the smoke.
I did a Bourbon & black pepper glaze over oak once that was really good. The glaze was brown sugar (maybe a ½ cup?) and some light corn syrup (maybe 2 tbsp?), and maybe 2 oz of Kentucky Straight bourbon, probably Old Grand Dad. Mix it into a glaze and brush it onto the slab, then hit it with a generous amount of cracked black pepper. Smoke over oak chips or chunks.
I also did a root beer glaze (brown sugar, a dash each of chili & cayenne peppers, and powdered mustard thinned out with root beer) and smoked that over cherry. It was like Dr. Pepper bacon. A little too sweet for me, but I got good feedback on it so I’ll pass that one along for your own exploration.
Good luck! Let us know how it works out!
(edit: so many typos!)
Definitely gonna try this! I was given some presliced 2" pork belly so I hope it doesn’t throw anything off.
I’ve got a ton of pecan laying about so I plan to use that for the smoking.
It’ll probably cure faster than 7 days. The thing I like about this method is that you can’t over cure because you’ve already put in all of the salts for the meat to absorb over all time. In fact, I’ve left slabs to cure for weeks on end because I was out of freezer space at the far end of the process
Oh snap! If you’ve got pecan then I can’t stop you from using a glaze made of brown sugar, melted butter, maple syruo and bourbon. Neither can I stop you from applying it 30 minutes into the smoke and one hour into the smoke. Nope, you’re just going to have to stop yourself