I’m trying something savoury this week.

This week’s bacon is cured with garlic, pepper, bay leaves, and juniper berries.
It should be ready to smoke by next Wednesday.

[27/09/11] Update:

Had to smoke 2 days early because some nasty weather is coming. It’s pretty firm, but may be slightly under-cured.

Its aroma has a hard-to-place sweetness about it from the bay leaves, but this is nicely tempered by the crushed juniper berries.

As usual, we start up the smoker nice and early.

Pictures of cooked bacon coming. It will need a day in the fridge for the taste to stabilise, but it’s pretty good. Lightly flavoured due to short curing time, but still nice.

So. It’s been a while, but I’ve just finished curing some maple-pork-belly bacon. Tomorrow, we smoke!

[14/09/11] Update: The smoking…

It’s good to see that the smoker still works (although it’s a little rusty), but I’m looking forward to buying an electric smoker next year so I can start cold-smoking.

Today’s smoke will be Hickory:

Aaaaaand… we’re off!

1 degree to go! Note that the thermometer says beef because it won’t let you cook pork at bacon-smoking temperatures (the bastard):

And here’s the (almost) finished product – a cured, smoked, pork belly (whole pork loin, without the bones, is a better cut, but harder to come by):

It’s best to let it cool overnight in the fridge before slicing, but I’m so excited I can’t wait:

It’s important to note that the bacon (especially the end pieces) will taste quite salty at first, but it will mellow if you keep it, uncovered, in the fridge for a day or 2.
Finally, we fry it up:

Delicious!

[20/09/11] Update: Michele and I have been eating bacon pretty much every day since I made this (we just ran out, today), and I have to say that it’s improved heaps with age.

Some pictures of the curing process for Pyjama Party bacon.

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I reworked the sugar-to-salt ratio for the Molly and PJ curing mixtures, and cut the curing time by a day and a half.
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