Homemade Bacon

Geoff @ imafoodblog posted a pretty nice how to on making your own bacon. It caught my attention immediately and I have to say it was pretty simple. I didn't have access to a smoker but I don't think that taking that extra step would have complicated things much.

I started out with just a few lbs of pig belly from Chinatown. It may have not been the best choice of product to make bacon, especially with my Chinese being so bad but it was way better than buying it from whole foods at ridiculous prices.

The thing about buying the pork belly in Chinatown is that they sell it in slabs all the way to the bone, which is nice but not easy 1-2-3 for bacon making. When I do it again I'll have to do a better job in picking marbleized pieces and trimming the piece for bacon.

I had decided from the get go to just do a salt cure, just to see what 'plain' bacon would taste like and to test out the method. What I ended up with was a dry version of roasted pig belly from Chinatown. It did have some bacon qualities, which was good enough for me. What I realized later was that I only cured the belly for 2 days whereas Geoff mentioned that you should cure for at least 3 days.

As I mentioned I didn't have access to a smoker, so I put it in the oven at the lowest setting with a container of water on the oven floor. I pretty much let it sit until the internal temp reached 150.

The next time around, and there will be a next time, I think I'll do a simple maple bacon and a peppered bacon. I should also probably find a way to raise the belly from the container so that the liquid can drain better.

I actually can't wait to make this again. I mean c'mon its bacon, how can you mess it up. Even as sub par bacon, it was quite delicious.