GUEST BLOGGER MONDAY - A Man & His Bacon...

Just a quick note for those of you following my personal Kimchi Chronicles, I've added some post mortem notes to the last batch (scroll to the end of the post) that you might find of interest. And now, with no further ado, I present to you my first guest blogger: 


DA MAN.
__________


Hello, ridiculous hungry readers. 

My name is Dean, or you may have heard of me as 'The Man' (though not in the popular culture or religious senses of the word).

Like many corn fed white guys who grew up in a middle class, middle-American household, I love most forms of 'sanitized' land-lubber meat. I grew up preferring leaner cuts cooked until they more resembled hockey pucks than the animals that were slaughtered for our enjoyment.

homecured bacon...

However, in my adulthood I've been introduced to many other cuisines and have expanded my palate greatly. I now prefer fattier cuts and MUCH less done preparations. One meat that I have loved all the way through my life, through the thick and the thin so-to-speak, is bacon. Delicious...fatty...heart stopping...artery clogging...sometimes smoky...BACON!!!!

Bacon goes with many things, hence the "Bacon makes everything better" phrase. Or was that butter? Perhaps both!! Being a home brewing and chili pepper/culinary herb growing type of DIY'er, how else could I further my unnatural love of bacon? By curing my own of course!! Let us enter the wonderful, yet mystic, world of bacon curing.

Ingredients

Pork Belly -- Be sure to pick a cut with a nice thick slab of meat between the fat layers

Kosher Salt -- Not as strong as table salt or as coarse as sea salt

Brown Sugar -- Just trust me on this one

Process

You should have a pan or dish of some kind that can keep the pork belly separated from the liquid that will leach from it. Otherwise, you will need to empty whatever dish you do use daily and dab the top of the pork belly with paper towels. With that out of the way, let's begin.

Each day rub a nice thick layer of salt on the skin (this side requires more salt to cure than the meat side) and a light layer of salt on ALL sides of the meat. After that rub in some brown sugar to the meat sides.

You can cure the pork belly in a dark cool place (if you prefer a more prosciutto-like musty flavor) or in the refrigerator. I did mine in the refrigerator. You will cure the meat for roughly five days, each day sprinkling salt on all sides of the meat but without rubbing. At this point you have two choices:

1) Rub some more brown sugar, slice into strips, and cook with your breakfast, burgers, scallops, or whatever else you like to have your bacon with.

2) Smoke the meat in a smoker. For this I recommend using apple wood chips and smoking with a really low temperature (200 degrees Farenheit) for around 90 minutes per pound--this should ideally yield an internal temperature of 150 degrees. This ensures that you get the meat nice and smoky without cooking it too far. Once done, slice and cook it up!

homefried bacon...
(with a little extra brown sugar sprinkled on top!)

I must say that this bacon was the best bacon I've ever had. Maybe it's because I made it and got all happy with my DIY-ness. Maybe it's because it was just plain tasty. I even ate it like a chip with a piece of raw uni (sea urchin) on top. That is quite a weird combo to most, but given the uni was live less than 60 seconds before I ate it and came from a local diver...I LOVED IT!!

beautiful bacon...

bacon, rice and kimchi - 
One of Shinae's favorite childhood meals.

I hope you all enjoy, I know I did. :P

The Man