Any specific brand better than others?

Have 8.5# belly thawing in the fridge, and will brine this Friday for the 7 days. I was stressing about buying a knife and getting the slices correct. However this morning at work I open up a cabinet in the kitchen and find a brand new, heavy duty meat slicer, so it looks like I am set!.

I'm slicing up my first go of a #5 lb pork belly tonight after smoking early yesterday morning. I went small in case I needed to tweak the process even thought there wasn't much do it. I'm pumped and very much looking forward to seeing how it turned out.

Put 3 shoulders in cure last Weds between me and my brother. Tried maple (not much flavor), plain cure, peppered ( top notch) and used mccormick smokehouse maple seasoning (best one).

I really appreciate that it is 90% lean instead of belly.

Cure 10 days, dry, season, smoke to 150, chill and slice.

We will be doing a bigger batch pretty soon.

https://instagr.am/p/ByfwaEMHZRl

https://instagr.am/p/ByfwZGvngue

AustinAgChef said:

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Here is the recipe for the basic dry cure that I use:

1 pound kosher salt
8 ounces sugar
8 teaspoons cure #1

Mix everything together well and store in an airtight container. Be sure to label what it is so that it does not get used mistakenly for just salt.

For every five pounds of meat you have, you'll want to use 1/4 cup of the cure mixture.

From here, you can add whatever other spices or seasonings you want to the cure. For mine, I added garlic, onion and bay leaves to half of the belly and the other had the addition of brown sugar and chipotle.

All you need to do is coat the entire belly with the cure mixture and then place in a 2 gallon ziploc bag. Into the refrigerator it goes for 5-7 days, flipping once a day. You will notice the meat get firmer throughout the curing process. If the meat is still a bit soft, it's not quite ready but that 7 day mark usually gets the trick done.

After that, you'll smoke the belly at 175-200 degrees until it reaches an internal temperature of 150 degrees. Then, chill overnight and once completely chilled, slice to your desired thickness. This batch was smoked with apple wood but hickory and pecan are also great choices for bacon.

*Note: This basic cure recipe comes from the charcuterie book by Michael Ruhlman & Brian Polcyn. These two are some of the most knowledgeable guys when it comes to salting, curing & smoking of meats. I took the two day class from Brian Polcyn and he knows his stuff.

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I've got a 5 lb belly in the refrigerator curing using 1/4 cup of cure mixture. After the belly had been curing for 8 hrs, I had quite a bit of water in the ziploc bag. Is this normal?
After that, I took the belly out, washed it off, dried it off, then used another 1/4 cup cure and put it back in the refrigerator. It seemed to me that if the belly is supposed to get firmer, then I should empty the bag rather than let it sit in there.
Did I mess this up? I don't remember my first batch creating this much liquid in the bag during the curing process.
TIA for your replies.

You're probably doing it right that cure leeches all the moisture out of the meat. After taking it out of the bag, just dry it off and refrigerate for a few hours before throwing it on the smoker.

Next time just let it be, at half a week, just massage the cure into the meat, without opening and getting rid of the water, and put it back into the refrigerator for the rest of the week. Dispose of the water when you open the bag in a week.

yea, leave it be...just flip it over in the bag once a day while it cures.

Cures are sort of picky when it comes to the ratio of meat to cure. You may have used too much, but too much is better than too little. It's still ok to eat though. If it's too salty, just use it in dishes where bacon is used (a big pot of beans) and just adjust the salt accordingly.

Bought an 8.5 lb belly yesterday (frozen skin-on is all I could find). I had the butcher cut in half for me in case I need to make any adjustments after the first batch. Thawing first half in fridge and will use the basic cure in this thread for my first try. I don't have a great set of knives but do have an electric knife that I use on turkey, roast beef, etc. Thinking that should work okay for the slicing. Anyone else tried using an electric knife?

HEB had small bellies today for 2.99/#. They've been 3.99 for as long as I've been watching them.

Got a trimmed 2.5# for my first test.

Made a bath of cure like posted on page 1 and then added some of the McCormicks smokehouse blend. Got it vacuum sealed in the fridge now.

I'm assuming that it's possible to cure for too long?

I put this guy in Sunday. This is going to be busy weekend, and I may not have time to smoke it Sunday.

What should I do?

Remove belly, pat dry, and just leave in fridge?

Or, can I just leave it vacuum sealed/curing until next weekend (two weeks curing)?

Thanks!

I'm not about to do all the math to figure out if this is an equalization cure or not, but given that the recipe is time sensitive, I'm going to assume it's not. If you can't smoke it after a week, remove it from the bag, rinse off the cure, and put it back in a clean bag. It will be fine to hold that way until you can smoke it. In fact, that extra time is good in that it will allow the cure to even out throughout the meat.

When it comes to curing, I much prefer to use an equalization cure, as it takes out all the guesswork and you don't have to worry about over-salting the meat.

Thanks. I'll just plan on taking it our, rinsing, and storing until I can smoke it.

No idea on type of cure. It's the same recipe AustinAgChef posted.

The wife says the bacon is awesome.

Got my Prague powder today! Making some quarantine bacon this weekend. Butcher shop is still open thankfully.

EDIT: Just realized I missed out on calling it Isolation Bacon

A few questions after making my first batch.

I had about a half lb of pure fat near the end of the portion that I trimmed, seasoned for cure, and vacuum sealed. What can I make with this? Belly guanciale?



Also, I sliced the belly in half because my vacuum seal bags weren't wide enough. Is this okay? Does it have any effect on cure time?

You can use the fat as you would salt pork.

Cutting the belly won't change the cure time.

Thanks for the info! I very much appreciate it. Can't wait!

I might have gone a little overboard with this bacon thing...

how long will this last in the fridge?

If vacuum sealed, a couple weeks easily, but it freezes very well.

HTownAg98 said:

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If vacuum sealed, a couple weeks easily, but it freezes very well.

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I've just got the cured slab in the fridge. I slice pieces off as I needed. Going on 4 weeks or so. Not sure if that's a big deal or not.

You might start noticing some undesirable funk if it goes much longer. You could always cut off chunks, wrap in plastic wrap, and put it in a ziplock bag in the freezer. It will keep for a year easy.

End result. Brown sugar/Chipotle.





Total haul:

~1.5 lbs pepper. Cubed up about 6 oz.
~1 lb brown sugar/chipotle
~8 oz of salt pork
~1 lb of cracklins. Not sure what to do with this. Assume I should follow the amazing ribs recipe and boil it, then dust with seasoning and smoke? Any suggestions?



So pumped with how it turned out, and I'm not sure I will ever buy bacon again if I can help it.

I know I've been spamming this thread, but I'm just so excited about this. If you're on the fence, don't hesitate!! Do this.



Finished up the buckboard bacon and it was arguably better than the belly. Went with a simple cure and smoked with mesquite. I liked the large amounts of lean compared to fat. Not to mention shoulder is significantly cheaper than belly (which was already cheap compared to finished bacon) and had been in the freezer for months.



They can keep the hand sanitizer. I think I have enough bacon now.

I think I have enough bacon now.


There is no such thing as too much bacon.

I'm actually almost out, so I suppose you're right. Need to fire up another batch!

I love this thread. Still haven't done it but plan too soon.

Been following this for a while and decided while I was stuck at home was a great time to make some bacon.

Picked up a belly from Costco and split it in half. Half was pepper and the other half was just the cure recipe from the first post in this thread.



That was just the black pepper half. My knife work is not the best and the pieces came out thicker than I wanted but they fried up just fine.

I figured while I had the smoker going I might as well make some pork belly burnt ends as well so grabbed another half belly from HEB and threw those on. My three year old was more than happy to help me out with this. First time doing burnt ends and while they are great, I should have made them spicier. The jalapenos and serranos were for a salsa verde I was making.

Has anyone ever wet cured / immersion cured pork belly?

Running a first trial of it and not sure how to feel about where it sits right now (14-15 days in).