NOTE: It is possible to soak the bacon after finishing it in the smoker and you may need to do so like I did. The goal is to remove the excess salt that has absorbed into the bacon, so that it isn’t overly salty. When an hour is up, dump the water and replace it with fresh cold water. Submerge the pork belly in the bowl of cold water and place it in the fridge to let it soak for an hour. After rinsing the pork belly, fill a large bowl or container with cold water.At the end of the seventh day, dump the liquid out of the bag containing the now cured pork belly and rinse the pork belly under cold running water to wash off any excess cure.Repeat this process for up to 7 days and no longer. After two days, flip the pork belly over and let it sit another two days.Place that bowl in the fridge and let it sit for two days. Place the zipper bag with the belly in it, in a large bowl or container just in case it leaks.Then carefully squeeze out as much of the air as you can from the bag and seal it. When the solution is well mixed, pour it into the bag over the pork belly.If you really want, you can use this recipe without the pink curing salt, but make sure to cook the pork belly to 160 degrees instead of 150 degrees. The goal is to use as little as possible, but still get the benefits to ensure a safe product at the end. People have mixed reviews about whether or not to use it and whether or not it is bad for you. NOTE: The last ingredient in the list (pink curing salt) is the preservative (sodium nitrite/nitrate) that helps to keep the meat pink and from growing bacteria. I’m always happy to revisit a recipe based on feedback! As always I appreciate reader feedback and understand that what may work for me or may work once may not work for everyone under all circumstances. Nonetheless, it’s all about balance and making sure the end product works. The goal of the salt (aside from seasoning) is to make sure bacteria doesn’t have a hospitable environment to grow. While this recipe did work out for me soaking the bacon in a cold water bath after smoking, I have adjusted the amounts of salt in the recipe to use less salt. UPDATE TO RECIPE: A reader wrote to me informing me that he followed this recipe exactly and the end result produced extremely salty bacon. Cut a thicker than usual slice cooked low and slow and pretend you’re having a bacon steak! The sky is the limit. Make it sweeter or more peppery or infused with maple extract. My recommendation is to make this recipe successfully once and then try to experiment with the flavors. The real benefit is that you can flavor the bacon however you want through the cure used and you can cut the slices as thick as you like, which is fun. Despite the immense satisfaction one receives after spending a week making a successful product, the reality is that it will probably taste very much like good quality bacon anyone can purchase from a grocery store. I wish I could tell you that making bacon at home is worth the wait, but it probably isn’t for most people just looking for a couple of strips for breakfast or a sandwich. So, don’t be fooled because as it turns out, if you don’t cure the pork belly before making bacon, it ends up tasting a bit like ham rather than bacon. Curing means the process to make homemade bacon takes about a week, so patience is a virtue. Stated another way, uncured bacon still uses nitrites/nitrates, but it just sources them from “natural” sources (unless the packaging explicitly states that there are no nitrates). It just doesn’t have the same SOURCE for the sodium nitrite/nitrate preservatives used in cured bacon. The reason I didn’t know bacon had to be cured was because of misleading packaging at grocery stores that claims some bacon is “uncured.” Despite those claims, their bacon is, in fact, cured. I knew it was smoked, but I didn’t realize that the process always required curing. For example, in a post-apocalyptic world that still has electricity, but where bacon is illegal, would I be able to make it myself from scratch? Now I know that the answer is probably, “yes!” Before discovering that I could make bacon, however, I needed to learn how it was made. I’m fascinated with the idea of being able to make any food at home.
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