Homemade Cured and Smoked Bacon
How to make your own bacon. This is better than anything you can buy at the store. It takes a little while to finish due to the curing process, but it is definitely worth it. You can use the bacon in the traditional way, and it will be amazing but consider making cubes or slabs. You will be the hero of the dinner table.
Equipment
- Vacuum Sealer (optional) it will tremendously help with the curing process
- Meat Slicer (optional) helps to make uniformly sliced strips of bacon
- Large Bowl
- Airtight container to hold extra cure A large used spice container works well
Ingredients
The Cure
- 3 percent by weight Cure Rub 3% of the total weight of the meat (1 pound of meat is 453.59 grams). If the meat is one pound you will need 13.6 grams of cure. This is important to calculate the correct amount of cure
The Meat
- Pork Belly Slab Any size will do. I like 2½ pound increments.1
Instructions
Make the Cure
- If not already completed, mix all the cure ingredients together and store in an airtight container. You will have extra if you follow my recipe.
Cure The Meat
- Measure 3% of the total weight of the meat (1 pound of meat is 453.59 grams) of cure. If the meat is one pound you will need 13.6 grams of cure. This is important to calculate the correct amount of cure
- Apply the set aside cure to the pork belly. Rub it on all sides of the pork belly. It is important to apply all the set aside cure to the meat, or the meat will not fully cure
- Vacuum seal the cured meat. You can also tightly wrap the meat with Saran Wrap
- Place the meat in the refrigerator for 7 days. Flip the meat 1-2 times daily
- After 7 days, pull the meat from the refrigerator and rinse off any remaining cure with cold water. The meat should have turned a redder color.
- Sample the pre-smoked meat by slicing off a small portion of the cured meat and fry it until done. If it is too salty, soak the meat in some water to leech out some of the salt.
- Pat the meat dry and return it to the refrigerator for one more overnight period
Smoke the meat
- Preheat your smoker to 200°F using your favorite heat/smoke fuel.
- Rub the meat with any flavor enhancers you might like. For example, red chili pepper flakes, maple syrup, brown sugar, maple syrup, black pepper, etc.
- Smoke the meat until it reaches an internal temperature of 150°F
- Pull the meat and let it rest overnight in the refrigerator wrapped in Saran Wrap
Serve the bacon
- Slice the meat using a meat slicer or a good slicing knife. You can also make chunks of bacon too. The chunks are my favorite.
Notes
1 - You will want to make at least 2-3 pounds since it takes at least 9 days to complete the curing and smoking process. I usually buy a 5-pound slab and cut it in half before curing the belly so I can create two assorted flavors.
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!