Chicharones Revisted

Bacon rind chicharones.

Just when I thought bacon couldn't get any better, someone inspires me to deep fry bacon skin for pork rinds. Boy howdy this works, and the flavor is crispy bubbly bacon air.

In the previous episode, I revealed the secrets to making restaurant quality chicharones at home. It's a fun parlor trick to impress your foodie friends, but making them out of bacon rinds is an important step forward the evolution of pork rinds that should appreciated by both the amateur and the enthusiast alike. My thanks goes regular reader TC for the comment that triggered this bacon revelation. TC, I hope you test this recipe and post your results soon.



Making Bacon

For these chicharones you're gonna need to make some bacon. Never made bacon before? No worries (as the kids say), check out my internationally recognized bacon manifesto, in it are detailed instructions on how to make bacon at home.


To remove the skin you can either slice it off while it is still warm, or or wait a day and peel it off when it cold. The advantage to the cold peel is that there is less fat adhering to the skin. But be careful there can be spots where the fat really wants to stick and come off in large chunks. Go slow and steady and you'll be fine.

Place the peeled skins flat in a pot and cover with water. Set to simmer. After about an hour check for doneness: If you can easily poke your finger through the skin, it's done.



Once cool, scrape the skins. It's annoying, but the cleaner they are, the more they pop.



Once clean, cut the skins into Frito sized shapes and put them into a very low oven (or dehydrator) to dry. After several hours (four to twelve depending on the oven temp) you should have a hard, unbending bacon chit.



Set up the fryer station, heat to 375F.



Drop a few in at a time and hold them under the oil. After a few seconds they should pop. They should be done cooking in about thirty seconds.



Toss with seasoning. Salt and pepper is fine, or try some sort of mixture. I put together sumac, dried thyme, and sesame seeds ( that's za'atar, yo) along with a little citric acid, for a flavoring I call Dorito.

Tasty bacon flavor in a crispy snack. Try it!

Cheers.

How to cook house cured bacon

It's all the rage.

WWBD?

What Would (a) Bacon-nut Do?

Recipes: Kombu + Freekeh cured Bacon (Beta), Bacon Bratwurst.

A few weeks back bacon enthusiasts gathered in the hip Logan Square neighborhood to sample bacon creations from some of Chicago's top chefs, to peruse porcine products from vendors and to worship at the larded altar of cured belly. Yes it was the second running of Baconfest Chicago. I can't really say I'm a bacon enthusiast, it's like saying I'm a breathing enthusiast, but breathing enthusiasts probably participate in marathons...I'm not doing that either... Even though I have pontificated about bacon in previous posts, I didn't think I needed to attend a fetish convention. That is until they announced an amateur bacon bake-off.



Oh boy, I have never entered a contest before, but I excitedly submitted my bacon bratwurst recipe. It proved very popular at Oktoberfest last year.
While I waited for an answer, I plotted my entry. The bacon I make is a pantry staple, nothing extreme or fancy, just bacon, a team player willing to lend it's smoky goodness to any situation. But now.....If I'm gonna be competing with baconphiles, I need to bring my A-game, I need a bacon with unattainable ingredients cured in a an unimaginable brine. I need to go gourmet.



Call in the Rod

So my friend Rod, has a brother, or is it a cousin, who has a farm out by Iowa City, he keeps a few hogs. Rod got one. When he ran out of room in his freezer he sent me a few packages.





Unattainable beautiful side pork ready to cure. Now for the never before imagined brine:





I knew I wanted to use some Kombu for its umami properties (I talk about kelp powder in a previous post), and I wanted to try some Lapsang Souchong tea to add smokiness to the brine. But I forgot to buy tea, so I went with my favorite smoked grain, Freekeh.

Kombu + Freekeh Brine (Beta)

2.5 L water
225g Salt
250g Sugar
150g Freekeh
22g (One sheet) Kombu (kelp)
10 g black peppercorns
5g whole coriander
5g mustard
2 fresh bay leaves (now that's gourmet!)

Combine all ingredients in a non-reactive pot and boil for two minutes. Chill before using.



I covered the bacon with the brine and let it soak overnight. The next day I let the bacon air dry in the fridge before smoking. That night I fired up the smoker. I hot smoked the slices for a half an hour, just enough time to snap a publicity photo (In case I had to sign autographs at the contest).



I'm ready for my close-up.



The bacon is made time to make a contest.

[BEEP BEEP -THE TELETYPE STARTS TAPPING A MESSAGE]


Oh, Someone is ringing across the Telex. It's Andre Vonbaconvitch from BaconFest Chicago:

Hi Mac,

We love these Brats. It was SO close to making the cut. Just wanted you to know it really does look delicious - and we're sorry we couldn't include it this year. Thank you so much for submitting.

[TELETYPE STOPS TAPPING]

[Pause]

Oh.

I made the sausage anyway. Running the stuffer cheers me up. Besides I didn't want have to wear a funny bacon hat.



Drei im weggla.

I was not about to stuff bacon willy-nilly into a sausage just to impress some trenchermen, I wanted a sausage with pedigree, so I cracked open my $5 copy of Larousse Grastronomique. I found many worthy sausages that are made with bacon, but brat from Nuremburg caught my eye. Nuremberg sausages are famous for thin and short. I read on one cultural website that the tourist should say "Drei im weggla! (three in a roll!)" to order this regional specialty. Here's my recipe:

Bacon Bratwurst

4 lbs/1.8Kg ground pork
14 oz/400g bacon (coarsely ground)
27 g salt
7g black pepper
3g marjoram
3g ground mustard
1g thyme
1g mace

water

Beat together all ingredients using a really big spoon or with the paddle attachement on a stand mixer, Add upto a cup of cold water to make a smooth mixture. Stuff into sheep casings. For the authentico look, fry in an Albert Turk Forged Iron Pan, serve three on bun.



I would try again next year, but in the past month I have lost my amateur status. Happy cooking.

Cheers.

Taking Back Bacon

Home-made Bacon, The Perfect Gift.

I am ready to give you a recipe for bacon. What's that? You already have one? I mean curing bacon, at home, and I want to put the bacon hoopla to rest right now: You're going to make this with the cheapest piece of meat you can find and cure it with ingredients you have in the kitchen right now. And it's gonna taste like bacon which means it's gonna taste great.



Over the past few months I have cured nearly forty pounds of bacon. I have brined it, dry rubbed it, used nitrites, not used nitrites, forgot sugar, hot smoked, cold smoked, no smoked, and then fed it all to my family and friends. So far nobody has complained.

But let's forget get all that for a moment. I want to talk to you about bacon, I want to make sure you know it's okay to strip away all the hype surrounding bacon and pork belly right now. Long after the Baconfests and BaconCamps and the "Current culinary couture (that)centers on () pork and farmers," go away, bacon will still be here for you. I want assure you that you can find bacon happiness in your own kitchen. So go head and chuck the rock star chefs and their rumaki redux, cancel your mail-order of double applewood smoked artisinal bacon from Oklahoma, it's time to take bacon back.



Bacon is our American heritage. Mariani reports in the Dictionary of American Food and Drink that "Bacon has long been a staple of households because of a long history of pork consumption and hog butchery."

Indeed.

Waverly Root, in the encyclopedic tome, Food notes "America was built by pioneers and pigs. The covered wagons which started west, even before the Gold Rush usually carried seventy-five pounds of bacon per adult."

Now I could go on quoting sources stressing the historical importance of salting and smoking pork as a matter of preservation and economics, but I think that would miss the most important connection between us and bacon, the taste. Salt, sugar, smoke, and fat. Are you ready to make some bacon?



The Belly

As I have mentioned in a previous post the hardest part of the bacon operation is procuring pork belly. Grocery stores usually don't carry the cut so you got to be creative. I get mine from a small meat packer that sells retail, look for a packer in your area. You could check with your favorite pork purveyor at the farmer's market. Also stores specializing in Asian or Latino food are good bets. Last week I got pork belly already cut into 2-1/2lb pieces at CAM Asia Supermarket in Columbus. When choosing a belly go for the thickest you can find, that'll make the best bacon. At the meat packer I have to buy a whole piece which can be 10 to 12 pounds and I have written the recipe for that amount. In terms of price I pay 1.39/lb at the packer, CAM charged us $2.25/lb, the price will go up from there.



The Cure

Sugar, salt and belly and you got bacon, the rest is icing. But icing is good sometimes, no? I have come to favor a combination pepper mustard, coriander, allspice, and bay (AKA pickling spice)to cure bacon and ham. But really salt and sugar is it; I used to believe that sugar (especially for brining) was not necessary but after side by side comparisons, sugar balances the salt.
Another important ingredient is curing salt. This ingredient goes by different names such as Insta cure #1, Prague Powder #1, DQ Cure, and it is 6.25 percent sodium nitrite. You can get this stuff mail order, but I buy mine at The Spice House.



Top piece cured with curing salt bottom piece without.

I have no problem using this stuff, it contributes to flavor, color and it substantially increases self life. Plus, since I'm certified in food service sanitation by the state of Illinois, I can't recommend cold smoking meat without using nitrites. But, back to what I said in the beginning, do you have pink salt in your kitchen? Do you need it to make bacon? Let's move on.

There are two ways to cure bacon,


applying a dry rub


or pickling in a brine.

I've done dry rub lots of times it's quick to start and it doesn't take a whole lot of room in the fridge. The first bacon I made was with a recipe from Charcuterie which procribed a dry rub. But I have come to like the pickle because the cure time is shorter and the cure is more thorough than the dry rub.

The smoke







Smoke is a visceral obsession. It is an olfactory memory that has collected and compounded in the human being for millions of years. The smell stands for warmth, safety and prosperity. Taking in this memory welted to fat, salt and sugar connects us to all who have come before us. It's the smile at the corners of our eyes.

So, is it important?

If you have a grill of some type then you should be smoking bacon. I have smoked bacon in many different ways, and I have always come away with the same conclusion: I don't like making a big production out of it. Please understand I am not some sort of artisinal baconphile, I don't dial my recipe on single grains salt or handfuls of hand hewn sawdust or multiple days of cold smoking. Minor tweaks I cannot do. I'm big picture: Look like bacon? Taste like bacon? Too salty? For finishing bacon I like hot smoking. I set an fire in the grill/smoker at 250F and cook until the bacon gets to a internal temperature of 150-160F. In terms time, it's usually two hours. Get some wood chips from the hardware store, cut up any sort of hardwood that you may have laying around, Two hours of gentle smoke makes a fine bacon.







Bacon finished in the oven without smoke is a perfectly delicious endeavour. In England cured belly without the smoke is called green bacon.


The recipe for Bacon

1 pork belly 10-12 pounds, skin on

Brine:
5 L water
440g Salt
50g Curing Salt*
450g Sugar

Pickling Spice
16g Black peppercorns
11g Allspice
10g coriander
10g brown mustard seed
4 bay leaves

*You can substitute an equal amount of regular salt for curing salt.

Mise en Bacon: Find non-reactive container(s) to brine belly. Trim into manageable squares. Save scraps for sausage, lard, or just throw them in the pickle.

Combine water, salt, sugar and pickling spices(if using, remember they're icing) and boil for one minute. The brine needs to cool (Not in the fridge) to 70F.


Make an ice bath in the sink or use ice paddles to cool quicker. I made ice paddles by freezing water in one quart milk jugs.


Immerse belly into cooled brine in non-reactive containers, refrigerate. Cure for three days.



The bacon needs to dry before smoking. Pull it from the brine and let it rest on a rack or dangle for a day. The stainless steel hooks pictured above came from an IKEA pot rack.

When you are ready to finish the bacon heat Smoker/grill/oven to 250F. Cook bacon to Intemp of 150F. About two hours.

Allow the bacon to cool, but while warm remove the rind (skin). You can save the rind for flavoring soups or beans.



Once cooled wrap and refrigerate. You can fry some up now, but it tastes better the next day.

I can't tell you exactly when bacon goes bad, I have kept bacon (cured with nitrites) in my fridge for months. For the stuff cured with just regular salt I start noticing change after a couple of weeks. Therefore I recommend you freeze this bacon after ten days.

SO you got all this bacon what are you going to do with it?


You could enter a BLT from scratch contest (or not)


Eat it for breakfast,


Or you can make bacon bratwurst.

Bacon works great in a supporting role too: Stews, beans, chili, meatloaf, pate, pizza, quiche. Bacon goes everywhere.



If you can't get you hands on pork belly, you can try a fatty piece of pork shoulder in the brine, I've done it a couple of times, it works well.



Whatever you do, make bacon, make it yours. If you have any questions please ask, I'm here to help.

Cheers.

Cold Smoke

Cold smoked bacon





cold smoker rig


We're heading to Columbus, and I like to bring an offering of bacon to the Buckeye.

A couple of weeks ago the New York Times had an article about Rock Star Butchers. It an annoying article about hipster foodies trying to obtain some earthy grittiness by watching some dude cut up a pig. I think you will get more enlightened (and get a better bang for your buck) by simply buying a whole chicken and cutting it up. Do it once a week for a month. Figure out how to use one bird for several meals. Seriously.

But wait a minute, one of these dudes get thirty bucks a head for a pig demo. A butcher shop charges $10,000 for an 8 week program. I gotta see what all the fuss is about.



I got some instruction books from the library and my mom talked to somebody at the Worthington farmer's market.

Put on your foodie helmets (chinstrap extra tight) we're going for a ride.


Oh and yeah it's official,



I don't have to take anymore guff.

Cheers

Belly Time

Have you been thinking about making bacon? Now is the perfect time; with the hint of fall in the air, the gentle wisps of hickory smoke should trigger tingling childhood memories like skipping stones on Lake Hope. The late tomatoes are now ripe on the vine. Make up some bread, some mayonnaise, and assemble BLT's. Serve the sandwiches with smoked corn chowder and now you are ready for the season. Maybe a nap first.



Before any napping there's work to be done. The hardest part of making bacon is finding the belly. Ok, if you live in town nick-named "Hog Butcher to the World," maybe it's not that hard. I get bellies at a meat packer about three miles from my house (say YEAH Southland), the problem is usually the ones in the case are pretty thin, they keep the nice ones in the back to make their own cured love. My friend Brian in New Jersey gets them from a Chinese market with the ribs attached. When searching for your own try to find a place where you can choose your piece, if you don't see one you like, ask if there are any others. Make sure you get a thick belly. If you are at a meat packing operation you'll have to buy a whole belly, they wont cut it, and you're gonna get 12 to 19 pounds of pork. But that's what you want. Get the biggest, thickest belly you can find, because we are not just making bacon, we are stocking the larder.



When you get you purchase home you may find one end is really thick with very little fat, and the other end thin and nothing but fat. In addition, an untrimmed pork belly with have fat and meat (a flap of sorts) that sits on top of our future bacon. Now you can simply cut it up into to manageable pieces a cure it, but why not make it look nice?

With my pork side I used the thick, lean portion of the belly and removed the lean flap to make couple of pounds of our house sausage. I used the fatty thin end and any trimmed fat to make lard. I also saved the skin from each of these sections and threw it in the freezer. Skin is useful to thicken soups, Cassoulet, or boiled and diced for a pâté.



I squared up the future bacon and rubbed it with a mixture of sugar, salt and curing salt. Curing salt is a special order item, I get mine at The Spice House in Chicago. I used the recipe from Charcuterie by Michael Ruhlman and Brian Polcyn, for the dry rub. On a smaller piece I poured on a little maple syrup in addition to the dry rub. The pieces go into ziploc bags and cure in the fridge for five days. In the past I have cured bacon in brine along with ham. I haven't noticed any big difference between the wet and dry cure, except that the wet cure only needs three days.

After the cure was complete, I rinsed off the bacon and let it rest in the fridge of 24 hours uncovered. I actually let it go for two days because I got busy with other stuff but the pork didn't mind.



I cold smoked both pieces of the belly for about four hours. The cold smoke rig consisted of a hot plate and stainless steel bowl inside my Bullet. The next day I hot smoked the larger slab for about two hours. While I had the smoker fired up I also threw on some eggplant (smoked baba ganouj) and I hot smoked a few ears of corn (shucked) for the smoky corn chowder. Bonne Femme made the soup.


Cold and hot smoked bacon


Cold smoked bacon

Either way its a winner.



My mom was here last week and she started her own bacon. She took it back to Columbus and she will smoke it on her kettle grill.

Bacon: A pantry staple that's fun for the whole family.



Cheers.