Bacon - too salty!

Hey folks, I'd appreciate some help debugging my first attmept at bacon. Here's what I did...

1) bought a small pork belly at local butcher shop
2) mixed up a simple cure (kosher salt, pink salt, sugar) based on the Charcuterie book.
3) measured out some of the cure (can't remember how much - I rounded up) dredged and packed as much as possible onto the pork belly.
4) transferred to a freezer bag and scooped some of the cure in there too (maybe this is where I went wrong) and added 2 oz or so of maple syrup.
5) cured for about 7 days in the fridge flipping every day. After day 3, I added 1.5 oz of bourbon.
6) rinsed off the cure. I thought I was thorough here, but maybe not thorough enough.
7) let sit overnight in fridge
8) smoked to 150
9) let cool
10) sliced a little off and fried it up to try it.

Way too salty.

Any suggestions of what I might have done wrong?

Thanks in advance!
-Michael

The end piece will be saltier then a few slices in. Did you only try a end piece?

Not sure if it would make a def but that recipe calls for the maple syrup to be added to the dry stuff to make a "slurry" of sorts. Then applied to belly.

When I make bacon after i've rinsed i try frying up a piece to "test" saltyness. If i find it too salty just soak in cold H20 for 30mins, rine and try again. Repeat one more time if necessary.

First of all, the taste will "even out" after a short while.
Second, I use between 2,2% of salt, or up to 3% when I make baken. Weigh the piece of belly, and find out how much salt let's say 2,5% is. Add the salt, and you can adjust the amount of salt on the next run according to your taste. Works as a charm. Flipping and so on is fine, it just gives you a more even curing.
"Rounding up"- not so good on a seven day cure. The amount of salt needs to be pretty accurate.

Cold water for thirty minutes or more, several hours is no problem, will reduce the amount of salt in the bacon. Again, the the bacon will take some time to "even out" the salt in the meat.

Michael,

The best advice I ever got on curing is to cut a sample piece before smoking and fry it up to test for the salt level. If too salty; soak/rinse a little longer, test again.

Paul

Yeah like Geir says, you need to figure out what % of salt you want for your meat and then build the cure around that. Last batch I made @ 3.5% salt by weight, and it came out great but I like salty bacon.

And, if I recall correctly Charcuterie just says to let the belly pick up as much salt as it will hold using the salt box method, and doesn't say anything about adding extra cure on top of that.

Thanks guys. Good advice. I'll try soaking it to see if I can salvage it. AFTER I try a piece from the middle. I'd expected the ends to be salty, but not THIS salty.