• 2437g pork belly
• 74g cure
• 10g juniper berries
• 4 bay leaves
• 20g black pepper
• 6g caraway
• 10g garlic powder

I only had enough caraway for the one batch (I guess – the quantities are my guesses), so the other half of the belly got some Sichuan spices as a substitute:

• 2050g pork belly
• 61g cure
• 10g juniper berries
• 3 bay leaves
• 16g black pepper
• 10g garlic powder
• 6g coriander seed
• 2 stars anise
• 4g Sichuan peppercorns

These bellies will come with us down to New Orleans for a rendez-vous with Budd’s smoker, and hopefully some good breakfasts over Mardi Gras.

I had a small epiphany on my personal process of curing bacon. I’ve been pretty consistently happy with the results, but it’s only recently that I’ve also been happy with my process. It always seemed to take longer than I expected, and by the time I got it into the fridge I’d feel more drained than the simple recipe I use suggested I should be. Of course it took me multiple iterations to notice that I wasn’t making one simple recipe: I was making three or so simple recipes (because why use one cure when there’s an opportunity to try three!), and those only after working out how to slice up the belly into appropriate portions. So suddenly, it’s three or four or five simple recipes, and there’s natural breaks and replanning and clean-ups, and the joy of bacon-making multiplies. Mechanics of curing meat, zen of curing meat.

But onward to this month’s batches.

This belly had sharper difference between its thick and thin parts than usual, so I cut it up to separate them for more even curing. The yield was one thin square about the size of a gallon ziplock, one think square about the same size, two thin strips, two thick strips: so four batches.

Batches 1 and 2 – pancetta flavors

Sort of. Jill is avoiding juniper berries and nutmeg for the next few months, so this is a variation on the usual proportions for pancetta flavors. As usual, reader, scale these proportions to your belly’s mass.

• 1,733g pork belly
• 43g cure
• 21g fresh ground black pepper
• 16g brown sugar
• 24g minced garlic
• 4 bay leaves, chopped up
• 1 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
• 3g ground cinnamon
• 3.5g ground cloves

Bag pork, distribute cure, distribute other ingredients (I’ve described the technique in an earlier post).

Batch 3 – ginger apple

This is a new one. First, make this paste:

• 326g apples, roughly chopped
• 12g dried ginger powder
• 6g dried cinnamon
• 44g honey
• 3.5g ground cloveswater

Add the measured ingredients to a food processor or blender and grind to a paste, adding water as needed.

• 1,240g pork belly
• 171g apple paste
• 31g cure
• Additional paste

Use the first portion of paste as a marinade for several days (I’ll update when I’ve decided how long). Then rinse and dry the pork, rebag, distribute cure, and distribute remaining paste.

Batch 4 – hot bacon

In October I was surprised at how little heat could arise from a certain amount of pepper. This month, perhaps I’ll be surprised at how hot papper can make bacon.

• 1,075g pork belly
• 32g cure
• 8g cayenne pepper
• 15g Sichuan peppercorns
• 8g red pepper flakes
• 18g black peppercorns
• 22g brown sugar

That’s alot of red pepper.

Grind the peppercorns and flakes. Bag the meat, distribute cure, distribute other ingredients.

Incidentally, both of the larger squares of bacon got the pancetta flavors; the thinner strips are in the apple paste; and the thicker strips are red with pepper. The thin square should be ready first – more details in a week or so!

Update (Jan. 25). That would be six days in the ginger-apple paste marinade – longer than I’d expected, but things got hectic. The thin pancetta flavors slab is out of the cure; in a couple of days the other slab and the pepper will be ready to smoke.
]]> http://maraist.org/january-bacon_01-2009/feed/ 0 http://maraist.org/louisiana-dining-roundup_01-2009/ http://maraist.org/louisiana-dining-roundup_01-2009/#comments Tue, 06 Jan 2009 05:16:44 +0000 jm http://maraist.org/?p=89 Just back from the annual holiday trip.

Lafayette

• La Pizzeria. So-so. Maybe it was an off night, maybe my tastes are changing. Might go back.
• Guidry’s Reef. Had the stuffed flounder: very good even if not as good as Jacque-Imo’s. Dad says it’s not the best of its peers, and he’s probably right, but it’s definitely still good.
• Pimon Thai. Went here for the first time in years: really good Thai food. Definitely worth going back.
• Cedar Grocery and Deli. Hadn’t been here before: we went for a small lunch, got the stuffed grape leaves, salad, hummus, all good. They have a “Greek shrimp po-boy” but I wasn’t hungry enough to try it.
• La Fonda. Bleh.
• Shucks (in Abbeville). Hadn’t been here before, definitely would go back – fat and fresh oysters, rich gumbo.
• Olde Tyme Grocery. As good as ever.
• Carraba’s. I thought they had just so-so food. Poor service.

New Orleans

• Hana. I’d been craving the Hana Special Roll for weeks: it’s what I used to order (along with a noodle salad) for takeout for comfort food when I lived here. Yep, still satisfying. And there’s something about the eel sauce here that’s different, and better, than everywhere else.
• Tacqueria Corona. They still make flautas like nowhere else. I’m told that there are now better taco places in the city, but even if these guys aren’t at the very top anymore, they’re still really, really close.
• Squeal BBQ. This is a new place, on Oak Street between Jacques-Imo’s and Ninja. It was good! Between the four of us we tried three of their meats (pulled pork, brisket, ribs) and they were all tasty – the meat had a nice flavor, the sauce was good but not overwhelming. All but one of the sides were great: nice baked beans, a good maque choux, hush puppies, onion rings, stuffed fried mushrooms.

Mole negra tagliatelle

We made of this kind than the saffron, and there were a few iterations of this recipe. Most mole recipes use toasted chili peppers; we used reduced fruit juices plus cayenne pepper.

Reduced red juices 1

• 2 part grape juice
• 1 part cherry juice
• 1 part blueberry juice

Reduce to one-fourth the original volume.

Reduced red juices 2

• 4 parts grape juice
• 3 parts cherry juice
• 2 parts blueberry juice

Reduce to one-fifth the original volume.

Mole pasta dough

Dry ingredients:

• 445g all-purpose flour
• 445g semolina flour
• 25g medium chili powder
• 12g cocoa
• 9g ground cinnamon
• 4g kosher (non-iodized) salt
• 11g cayenne pepper

Wet ingredients:

• 5 eggs (248g)
• 26g reduced red juices
• 41g water
• 4g almond extract
• 6g hazelnut extract

As needed:

• Additional water, semolina flour

Mix the dry ingredients together well. Add wet ingredients and work into a smooth dough, adding extra water and/or semolina flour as needed. Form dough into a ball, rub a little extra semolina around the outside to prevent sticking, place in a bowl, cover with a wet towel, and let sit at room temperature for at least an hour. Roll and cut to desired thickness and shape; cook immediately or hang to dry.

In retrospect, we could probably have reduced the juices less, and skipped the 41g water, but we made several batches’ worth of reduced juice at once.

Saffron fettucine

• 2g saffron (about 2 teaspoons, or extra to taste)
• 1/3 cup water
• 400g all-purpose flour
• 400g semolina flour
• 3g salt
• 5 egg yolks

Crush saffron. Boil water, add saffron, stir and allow to steep. Combine flours and salt, mix well. Incorporate eggs, saffron and water into flour (use a spatula to move all of the saffron), and work into a dough, adding extra water and/or semolina flour as necessary. Form dough into a ball, rub a little extra semolina around the outside to prevent sticking, place in a bowl, cover with a wet towel, and let sit at room temperature for at least an hour. Roll and cut to desired thickness and shape; cook immediately or hang to dry.

The pork is looking good. I hadn’t planned to let Batches 2 and 3 go quite so long before getting their cures, but they seem fine. Yesterday I washed off the flavoring from each, patted them dry, added first each one’s cure and then on top a second batch of the flavorings. I went with basically the same amounts as before, with just a couple of changes:

• Instead of mollasses on Batch 2, I stirred in a tablespoon of brown sugar to the herbs.
• We ran out of cayenne, so there’s extra red pepper flakes in Batch 3.

Forgot to take pictures, of course. Next check-in to turn them all tomorrow, at Day 5.

Batch 1 – pancetta flavors

• 1.6kg pork belly
• 40g cure
• 20g fresh ground black pepper
• 15g brown sugar
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 10 juniper berries, minced
• 3 bay leaves, chopped up
• 3g nutmeg, chopped or grated
• 2g fresh thyme, chopped

About the cure: I use Ruhlman’s basic cure at a ratio of 25g cure to 1kg belly. His book gives wider ranges of meat weight for a given amount of cure, and I like a rule, so I picked a nice round ratio. The meat goes into a ziplock bag, cure onto the meat as evenly as possible, then the other stuff over the meat and cure. Seal the bag, then double-bag, and into the refrigerator.

Batch 2 – fresh herbs

So the first batch gets everything all at once – cure on meat, then the other favoring bits on top. The other batches get two rubs – the first with just the flavoring bits for a few days, then that gets washed off, and the second rub is first the cure, and then a second mix of the flavoring. I’d tried that last time, and it seemed to be a better job of getting the flavor into the bacon.

• 1.83kg pork belly
• 1 tablespoon mollasses
• 8g fresh sage
• 2g fresh rosemary
• 18 or so chives
• 4g thyme
• 8 cloves
• 2 cardamom pods
• (For later) 46g cure

On day 1, bag the pork, rub the mollasses over it. Mince all the herbs and grind the spices, and spread over the pork. Seal, and into the fridge. I did double-bag this one because without the cure, it won’t extract too much moisture, so I’m not worried about leaks.

Batch 3 – tingly hot

Same technique here as for Batch 2 – a few days with just the flavoring additions before curing, to better infuse them into the meat.

• 1.65kg pork belly
• 17g suchuan peppercorns
• 10g black pappercorns
• 5g red papper flakes
• 1g cayenne
• 1g star anise (2 stars)
• 4g cinnamon (1 stick)
• 10g brown sugar
• 41g cure (for later)

Grind all the spices together, and mix in the sugar. Bag the belly, distribute the rub over the meat, seak the bag, and into the fridge.

I’ll post again in a few days when I check in with the bacon-to-be.