I recently finished eating a 5 lb. slab of this and I have to say it was the best bacon i've ever 'et. Here's the cure and the process. Of course, it's copyright Michael Ruhlman and you can check out more great cured meat recipes in his wonderful book Charcuterie.
Maple Cured Bacon
One 5 lb. piece of pork belly, rind on
2 ounces kosher salt
1/4 C. pure Maple syrup
2 t. pink salt (a curing salt, not the Hawain stuff)
1/4 C. Maple sugar (pricey, worth it)
Simply mix up all the ingredients for the cure (it will be a sort of yellow slurry) and spread it all over the pork belly, making sure to get under all the nooks and crannies and on the sides as well. Make the coating as evenly as possible on both sides so the whole thing has a nice coating (including the rind). Place in a 2.5 gallon zip lock bag and sort of fold up the sides so that the liquid that exudes from the belly is in constant contact with the meat (will take a bit of folding, the bag will be much larger than the belly). Once you've done that, throw it in the fridge (36-40 degrees) for 7 days, flipping it over every other day. On the 7th day, remove the belly from the bag and wash all the cure off. Put it on some sort of drying rack (I use one of the cheapies from walmart used for allowing cookies to cool) and stick it in back in the fridge for 1 day to dry out (form the pellicle).
Next, take the bacon out of the fridge and hot smoke it (about 200 degrees) until your therm reads 147. Take the slab out, place it in another zip lock bag, and immerse in a cool water bath to cool it quickly. Put it in the fridge, and now you've got bacon!!!!
Ruhlman suggests slicing the rind off after smoking. I did it before smoking, because I wanted more smoke flavor for the bacon itself. I guess some people also leave the rind on and just slice as is (I'm going to do this next time...I've discovered I like rind on bacon).
Good luck!
Maple Cured Bacon
One 5 lb. piece of pork belly, rind on
2 ounces kosher salt
1/4 C. pure Maple syrup
2 t. pink salt (a curing salt, not the Hawain stuff)
1/4 C. Maple sugar (pricey, worth it)
Simply mix up all the ingredients for the cure (it will be a sort of yellow slurry) and spread it all over the pork belly, making sure to get under all the nooks and crannies and on the sides as well. Make the coating as evenly as possible on both sides so the whole thing has a nice coating (including the rind). Place in a 2.5 gallon zip lock bag and sort of fold up the sides so that the liquid that exudes from the belly is in constant contact with the meat (will take a bit of folding, the bag will be much larger than the belly). Once you've done that, throw it in the fridge (36-40 degrees) for 7 days, flipping it over every other day. On the 7th day, remove the belly from the bag and wash all the cure off. Put it on some sort of drying rack (I use one of the cheapies from walmart used for allowing cookies to cool) and stick it in back in the fridge for 1 day to dry out (form the pellicle).
Next, take the bacon out of the fridge and hot smoke it (about 200 degrees) until your therm reads 147. Take the slab out, place it in another zip lock bag, and immerse in a cool water bath to cool it quickly. Put it in the fridge, and now you've got bacon!!!!
Ruhlman suggests slicing the rind off after smoking. I did it before smoking, because I wanted more smoke flavor for the bacon itself. I guess some people also leave the rind on and just slice as is (I'm going to do this next time...I've discovered I like rind on bacon).
Good luck!
