How to Cure and Smoke Bacon

By foodiva

Ingredients

• 1 whole belly, cut into 3 sections (each of our belly slabs has averaged about 12 pounds, so that would be 4 pound sections)
• 3 1/4 c. coarse sea salt
• 2 t. saltpetre, optional (Check for saltpeter on Ebay or at an Italian specialty market)
• a few bay leaves, finely crushed
• 25 juniper berries, lightly crushed (Buy Juniper Berries here)
• 1 3/4 c. sweetener, such as evaporated cane juice or brown sugar
• 2 T. coarse black pepper

Details

Servings 1
Adapted from reformationacres.com

Preparation

Step 1

Prepare the ingredients and mix them together in a bowl.

Thoroughly rub the cure all over your belly sections, making sure to get every little bit covered with the salt & sugar mix. Reserve the additional cure.

After a day the cure should have pulled moisture out of the meat. Pour it off and then re-rub the bacon with some of the additional cure as you did before.

Fry up a little test piece to make sure you have enough salt rinsed out. Remember that if you cut from a narrow end, it will be saltier than a thick middle piece.

Lay out the bacon, singly this time in the refrigerator for a day to allow the exterior skin to prepare for smoking. This will make a slightly tacky skin to which the smoke will adhere better.

Chill the smoked slabs prior to slicing to make it easier.

Cook the bacon in an oven preheated to 400 degrees for about 15 minutes depending on the thickness of the slices. (We find that homemade bacon retains more flavor during oven baking than in a skillet.)

Definitely ask the butcher for more bacon! No matter what breed we’ve raised, we’ve gotten an average of maybe 13-14 pounds of bacon *per half*. They probably left some of it on the ribs to make them meatier. Still though, that’s 7# per half. I shudder to think they put any of it into the ground meat…