The Best Homemade Bacon Recipe Ever
There aren't many people that don't start to salivate when thinking of the taste of really good bacon. Making it yourself is next level and you can be sure there are no other nasties added to into the mix ...
Method
- 1.5kg pork belly or loin. Belly = streaky bacon. Loin = eye bacon
- Remove the skin. Set aside to cook crackling if desired
- Prepare brine - blend 1 whole celery with 1 to 2 litres of water. Add quarter cup of peppercorns, 1/2 cup salt, 1 tsp beetroot powder and 1 cup honey. Feel free to add any extra flavours you desire.
- Place the pork in the brine (we use a deep sauce pot) and refrigerate for 4-6 days.
- Remove pork from brine and clean with fresh water and pat dry.
- To cook, you can use an oven or smoker.
- Smoker - place in the smoker at 180 degrees F and smoke until internal temperature of 150 degrees F. Depending on the size of the pork, this could be 3-6 hours (or longer)
- Oven - turn the oven to lowest temperature (preferably 80 or 90 degrees C). Place pork in oven and cook until internal temperature reaches 65 degrees C.
Note: (Most smokers us °F instead of °C, which is why they are shown differently above)
- Once cooked, allow to cool. Wrap in foil and refrigerate overnight. This allows the meat to firm up and the collagen/fat to harden inside the pork for easy slicing. If cooking multiple pieces of pork, we freeze all but one to slice when ready to eat.
- Using a meat slicer (or knife if you don’t have one) slice the bacon to your desired thickness.
- Enjoy the best bacon ever 🤤🤤🤤🤤
