Chilli and Rum Bacon

Read Time:2 Minute, 33 Second

Making Bacon at home is very easy. The best thing is you can play around with your own flavour combinations.

There are lots of different premix spices you can use to make your bacon, but with just a few ingredients you can make your own. Below we will make some bacon with a dry rub cure.

Ingredients:

1.5kg pork belly
¼ cup kosher salt
¼ cup brown sugar
3g cure no 1 ( 2 g per kg of meat)
4 tbsp dried chilli flakes
¼ cup bundy rum
1tsp liquid smoke (optional if you are cooking the bacon in the oven)

Method:

Trim up your cut of meat. Try and square up the meat as best you can.
Measure your cure and mix together with the salt, brown sugar and chilli flakes.
Rub your dry cure mix into the pork. Ensure that it is fully covered.
Put your pork into either an air-tight container, zip lock bag or vacuum seal it. Vacuum sealing is my preferred option.
Before you seal your pork, pour your liquid smoke and rum over the pork.
Seal the pork and ensure you expel the air from either the bag or container. Once sealed place in the refrigerator.
For every 500g of meat you will need to cure it for 1 day. I would suggest curing for minimum 4 days and a max of 8 days. The longer its stays in the cure after the required time, the more saltier it will become.
Turn your pork every 24 hours. There will be a liquid build up starting in the bag. This is the salt pulling moisture from the pork. Leave this in with your meat, do not drain it.
Once it has cured for the desired time, remove from the bag, rinse it under the tap to remove an salt and cure then soak it in cool water for 60 min. This will help remove excess cure and also salt.
Remove from the water and pat it dry. If you wish you can now add further chilli and rum to the pork. Place it on a plate and back in the fridge uncovered for a further 24 hours. During this time the meat will form a pellicle. This is what absorbs all the smoky flavour when cooking.
If you are smoking the pork pre-heat your smoker to 110 and add your desired wood chips. Apple or cherry wood chips work great. The pork needs to be cooked until it reaches an internal temperature of 65 degrees Celsius. If you are using an oven, preheat your oven to 110 degrees Celsius and cook until internal temperature reaches 65 degrees Celsius.
Once it has reached the internal temperature of 65 degrees Celsius, remove from the oven or smoker and place in the fridge to cool.
After it has cooled for 2 hours you can now slice to your desired thickness, fry it in a pan and enjoy!
The bacon will last in your fridge for around 3 weeks, mine is normally eaten long before that.