Shouldn’t Pork Belly ....

[ecowper]

Be it’s own sub-forum? Cause Bacon is pretty much the greatest food EVER

anyhow, I’ve got 10 lbs of belly brining right now. Used my Maple-Whiskey recipe, to which I added fresh thyme and rosemary.

I buy belly at Costco for $2.99 lb. When you add up the cost of my ingredients, plus charcoal and wood, I am probably at $3.50/lb cost. Even if you add in my time and effort, you’re not at more than $3.75/lb ;-) ..... I can make bacon better than anything you’ll ever get in a store for 1/3 the cost of "artisanal bacon"

[Spinaker]

Awesome! You got it right. As Meathead says, "It is soooo much better than store bought!"

I too have a belly curing right now. I had a hog slaughtered on my uncles farm and the belly wouldn't fit in my freezer, so I had to think fast. Bacon was an easy choice!

Looking forward to your results!

[grantgallagher]

I had the unpleasant experience of trying that. Never, ever, ever, again.

[Spinaker]

I had to eat it every xmas. The worst. grantgallagher

[EdF]

How about some Surstromming? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-qflm0APTk

[Steve R.]

You had me at Maple-Whiskey recipe. Do tell...

[radshop]

I second that. I smoked pork belly for the first time a few weeks ago. I’ve never cured bacon. That recipe might inspire me to go for it.

[Jerod Broussard]

Sooo need to get a belly.

[Spinaker]

Yeah, Don't do her like that, load up that pellet rig!

[Ahumadora]

Keep eating and drinking enough and it will develop over time.

[ecowper]

Steve R. .... below is my maple-whiskey recipe ... it’s designed for 3 lbs of pork belly .... so for more, or less pork belly, you need to adjust the Prague powder, water, maple syrup, etc for the change in meat content.

once cured, which takes 5-7 days, then you smoke to 155 internal temp

3.5 grams Prague Powder #1
4 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
4 1/2 teaspoons ground black pepper
2 cloves garlic (or 1 tsp minced garlic)
3 tablespoons dark brown sugar
3/4 cup distilled water
1/2 cup dark maple syrup
2 tbsp whiskey .... rye, bourbon, single malt

[Ahumadora]

Nice, I like to go heavy on the pepper also. Would like to try it, but can't obtain maple syrup in Argentina.

[Henrik]

I agree, pork belly is incredible!

[Jerod Broussard]

ecowper why would it need it if brisket is doing just fine in the beef?

[Henrik]

That's a no go, for a good reason. A sub forum is created when there is a large enough volume of posts to warrant one. So keep smokin' that pork belly!

[Ahumadora]

They really should put pork belly at the top of the food pyramid.

[Huskee]

People regularly complain to me there are too many sub-forums as it is. How do you please everyone?

Ribs, bacon, brisket, butts, chucks, steaks. They're all big topics here and rightly so, yet they all nestle nicely under their parent Pork or Beef channel.

[Ahumadora]

KISS Keep it stupid simple. You can't please everyone. Just ask my wife

[ecowper]

Huskee I was just fooling around .... I think the way the forums are set up is great .... Except for the lack of a Hasty-Bake sub-forum, of course,

[Thom Emery]

I smoked last weekend
oh my a crowd pleaser for sure

[Frozen Smoke]

I have a 13lb Kurubota belly from SRF in the freezer. Paid for a 5 to 6lb and that monster showed up. Half will be bacon and the rest will get divided up into other forms of pork belly goodness!

[Troutman]

My Filipino wife just cured a pork belly with brown sugar, salt, garlic and some sort of mystery stuff (I wasn’t really paying attention). Anyway she cuts it in strips, let’s it cure and pulls some out yesterday and fries some up. I mean holy gawd it was friggin’ awesome. I’m smoking the rest today with a roast I’m prepping. Pork fat rules !!!!!

So your real question ecowper is "shouldn’t belly be its own food group" !!

[Bumby]

Does she cure each slice separately? I've been debating that...

[Troutman]

Yea she cut it in into like 2" strips and cured it that way. I guess to get more surface area coated and ready to cook I suppose. Like I said I had no idea she knew how to do all that, kind of blew me away. In the Philippines they put them on a string and cure them in the sun. I told her no way I was going for that, slow smoke ok.

[Bumby]

ecowper Thanks for sharing your recipe. I'll have to try that -- I'm looking for different bacon variations (mine has been a modified version of the maple recipe with paprika and chipotle powder). I bet your recipe would be amazing wrapped around scallops, broiled in the oven. Now I gotta make more bacon!

[Ahumadora]

Try honey/ jalapeño/pepper

[Bumby]

Thanks - will try that, too!

[ecowper]

Ahumadora there’s several choices to substitute for maple syrup, depending on what you can get .....

Honey - 1.33 parts honey for 1 part maple syrup
molasses - 1 part molasses for 1 part maple syrup

Or make a faux maple syrup

• 1 cup of white sugar
• 1 cup of packed brown sugar
• 1 cup of boiling water
• 1 teaspoon of butter
• 1/4 teaspoon of vanilla extract

In a saucepan, combine all of the ingredients over medium heat. bring to a boil, then turn down the heat and let simmer for 10 minutes.

[ecowper]

Bumby here is a bacon recipe that I adapted from Mike Ruhlman’s sweet and savory cure

My bacon recipes are always based on 3 lbs of pork belly. So, if you use a different weight of belly, you need to adjust the liquid, Prague powder and salt accordingly.

3.5 grams Prague Powder #1
56 grams (2 oz) kosher salt
4 tablespoons coarsely ground black pepper
4 bay leaves, crumbled
1 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
1/4 cup brown sugar or honey or maple syrup
5 cloves of garlic, smashed with the flat side of a chef’s knife
2 tablespoons juniper berries, lightly crushed (optional)
5 to 10 sprigs fresh thyme (optional)
1 1/4 cups distilled water

cure for 5-7 days. I cure in gallon ziplock bags. I turn the belly and rub the cure into it once a day. Then I smoke the bacon to an internal temp of 155-160.

:-)

[Bumby]

Thanks, man!

[ecowper]

Just a precaution .... when you are curing meats, you need to use Prof Blonder’s cure calculator. Since my pork belly is between 1.5 and 2 inches thick, and since I always cut my belly into 3 lb pieces, I can have a standard recipe for amount of liquid, Prague Powder #1 and length of time in the cure.

I measure both the Prague Powder and the kosher salt by weight, not by teaspoons or similarly inaccurate measurements. When curing meat, you are risking your life if the cure is not done right.

BUT if you change the weight or thickness or amount of liquid, then the amount of Prague Powder and length of time in the cure must change also.

https://amazingribs.com/tested-recip...g-meats-safely

[Bumby]

Just started about 12 pounds of bacon. Made 4 versions. @ecowper's whiskey maple and sweet and savory, @Ahumadora's honey, pepper and jalapeño and my own hot and sweet maple. Will let you know how they go!