10lbs of homemade bacon

is still just not enough.

Wow! I'm gonna have to attempt this someday.

That looks like some prime pork!

That looks good! I make my own too but don't have an electric slicer. What kind do you use to slice it? I slice mine thick with a knife on the cutting board.

Looks fantastic, did you slaughter a domestic pig?

I use a Cabelas slicer. I like the ease and uniformity. Pork belly I picked up from Costco and cured for 14 days and cold smoked for 3 hours after it formed a nice pellicle.

Dang that looks excellent! Good work

Thanks.

Nice

Excellent!

Payne would have shared 9 lbs of those 10 lbs with his friends.... ...just saying...

I'll send you my address and mailing instruction......

Would

That is what Bacon should look like. I salute you.

Looking good

That looks awesome! I need to learn how to do that. I saw the pork belly at Costco myself the other day.

no time like the present

Got a website with the gist of it or a recipe you used?

Easy
Per 5lbs of pork belly

rinse belly clean then dry
1/4 cup of Kosher or sea salt (non iodized)
1/2 cup of brown sugar (you can substitute white but its sweet or honey, maple, etc)
1/2 tsp pink cure salt

Mix all the ingredients thoroughly and rub entire amount onto the belly. Don't lose any of it. Whatever won't stick put into the bag with the belly.

Put coated belly into a bag that won't leak. I put mine in a vacuum sealed bag. Put in fridge and flip it every day or two.

You'll start to see a lot of liquid thats ok.

I almost always go at least 2 weeks. You can do less if you like but I feel its a better product with at least 2 weeks and beautiful color.

Remove, rinse and put into a bin with water to cover and lots of ice. Soak for about an hour then cut a small piece and fry it to see if salt content is to your liking. When it is remove and pat dry. You can then coat with whatever you desire. I use light coat granulated garlic and coarse pepper... lots and lots of pepper. Remember its only a thin edge by the time you slice it. Put back into fridge on a drying rack (so both sides dry). about 12 hours in I flip it so both sides dry evenly. I usually try to go 48 hours drying time. It'll form a nice skin called a pellicle. This will allow your bacon to absorb smoke. Pull it out and put it in a cold smoker for as long as you want depending on how strong a flavor of smoke you want. I go 1-3 hours depending on the smoke that day. Remember a cold smoke not a hot smoke. You're not cooking it your just infusing flavor and adding color. Pull it out, put it in a bag and lay flat in the freezer. When its frozen or almost frozen take it out and slice. If you want to do it that same day I'd pull it out before its completely frozen. If it freezes completely just remove and thaw out for maybe 30-60 min. You don't want it to thaw out too mcuh just enough you can cut through it nicely. Enjoy.

p.s. some will put "stuff" in the curing process for flavoring like pepper, etc etc... I've done it and never noticed a difference. Just more of a pain and cost IMO. K.I.S.S.

oh and if you use a slicer take measurements to cut the belly into portions that fit. appearance is important to me so I don't cut the width of the bacon. It won't fit in my slicer because that bacon is probably 10-12" wide. So I let mine that juuuuuust enough that I can just get it to fold in half (like an L shape actually) and then run it through the slicer.

Remember this isn't the junk that you get at the grocery store. cook it a lot lower and slower in a pan than you would store bought stuff or it'll burn. Store bought has lots and lots of fat and pumped full of water for weight so they can make more $$$.

Got this saved to Evernote, thank you sir!

Last time I priced pork belly it was $18 per pound, it may be better quality bacon, but for that price I can buy a lot of Wrights brand bacon

I did the same thing last weekend but only 5lbs. First time I've ever tried it, don't know that I'll ever buy bacon at the store again.

where do you buy pork belly? does HEB carry? I don't recall seeing it at any of our local grocery stores ... as a kid, we had several meat markets and even a slaughter house, but not sure where to buy now

I get it at Costco. For 8-10lbs of prime prime belly its runs about $24-28.