The Greatest Condiment On Earth

Bacon!

Lets talk bacon. Clearly its one of the greatest creations. You head to your grocers "bacon section" and you have center cut, thick cut, maple, honey, brown sugar, lean, 0% sodium, 0% pork and everything in-between. Then you look at the price and it never makes any sense. I always liked thick cut bacon, but who are we kidding, Ill eat any kind put in front of me, even turkey bacon! 


Shortly after I started curing meats, I learned that there are 2 major curing agents; curing salt #2 and pink salt. Most meats that are cured will contain one of these 2 ingredients to help preserve the meat. Bacon needs a basic cure mix made up of regular salt, sugar and pink salt. Adding your mixture to a nice, fatty slab of pork belly with a few extra flavors added in will give you some of the best bacon you've ever had! I would recommend buying maple sugar for a sweet bacon and garlic, cracked black pepper and spices for a savory bacon. 

The Basic Cure

• 1 pound (450 grams) kosher salt

• 8 ounces (225 grams) sugar

• 2 ounces or 10 tsp (50 grams) pink salt 

The Process

Let me start off by saying its easy, so don't feel overwhelmed. Go to your grocery store and ask the butcher for a 5 pound slab of pork belly. Pork belly is pretty cheap by the pound compared to bacon, so you won't be spending very much. I usually will purchase a whole 15 pound belly from Restaurant Depot (membership required) for around $40. Place the slab of belly in a gallon sized ziplock bag or a non-reactive (plastic or glass) covered container. You want to spread about 4 Tbsp of your basic cure mixture all over the belly. Then, choose a flavor from below and spread that over the belly as well. Place the container in the fridge for 7 days. You want to turn the meat over every other day. The moisture from the meat will start to be extracted from the cure mixture and pool in your container. Leave all of that goodness in there! The meat will soak in that salty liquid and become cured (hence the turning every other day). After 7 days, dump out the liquid and soak the meat for 2 hours in fresh water. After 2 hours, dump out the water and leave the meat in the fridge overnight to let any extra liquid drain from the belly. 

Flavors (per 5 pounds)

Sweet:

1/2 cup maple sugar

3 Tbsp burbon

4-5 drops liquid smoke (optional)

Savery:

4-5 smashed garlic cloves

2 Tbsp whole peppercorns, cracked (place in a plastic bag and hit with a rolling pin)

10-12 Bay leaves

1 tsp toasted fennel seeds

1 tsp toasted coriander seeds

Cooking

After the meat has drained overnight, take the meat out. Preheat the oven to 200 degrees. Place the belly in a roasting pan, or use a cooling rack in a cookie sheet if you don't have a roasting pan. Let the belly cook for 2-2.5 hours. Ideally you want the center of the meat to be 145 degrees. When you're done, pull the meat out, let it cool enough to handle, and cut it up into thin slices (you choose how thick you want it). Thats it, you're done! Fry a few pieces up whenever you want some bacon! Keep the bacon in your fridge or freeze (vac-sealed is best) any extra you want to save. Use the refrigerated bacon within about 2 weeks. Cheers!

Forget Store Bought Salsa...

Homemade Salsa

Salsa has become as common as ketchup or mustard. The difference is that there are hundreds of kinds of salsa. The grocery stores have entire sections of salsas. They come in multiple flavors, different levels of heat and even with famous baseball players and celebrities on the label. I have made many of my own flavored salsas. The one element that sticks out in my mind with homemade salsa is freshness. When you crack open a jar of homemade salsa a few months after making it and it tastes as fresh as the day you cut the vegetables, there is an amazing sensation that comes over your taste buds. I have yet to find a jarred salsa in the grocery store that can match such a fresh and wonderful taste. After multiple attempts, I have come up with a recipe that is fresh, consistent and well rounded. One small change and you can make the batch as mild or as hot as you would like. You can even split a batch and have mild, medium and hot just by adding additional hot peppers as you go. This recipe needs to simmer for at least an hour and an additional 45 minutes in the canning bath. 

What you need:

Canning equipment (jars, lids, pot, etc.), Large stockpot

Ingredients (Makes 10 quart-sized mason jars):

24-26 salsa tomatoes, 3 onions, 1 green pepper, 3 limes, 3-15 habaneros (depending on the level of heat you want), bushel parsley, bushel cilantro, 3 cans petite diced tomatoes, 1/2 cup ketchup, salt and pepper. 

Directions:

Some people choose to de-skin the tomatoes. I personally leave the skin on. If you choose to de-skin the tomatoes, dip the tomatoes in boiling water for 30-60 second (until skin begins to split), then remove and peel the skin off. Slice the tomatoes vertically in half. Lightly squeeze the seeds out (some seeds can stay in the tomatoes). Dice the tomatoes into small even pieces. Add the tomatoes to the large stockpot and place the heat on medium. Add the cans of petite-diced tomatoes. (Why use the cans of tomatoes? The cans add liquid to the salsa without watering it down. I found this helps the flavors blend better.) Add the ketchup and the juice of the 3 limes. Cover the pot and begin dicing the 3 onions and green pepper. Add the onion and green pepper to the pot. Next, mince the habaneros and add them to your salsa mix. (Be careful! Gloves may not be a bad idea and DO NOT touch your eyes or nose after cutting, it will burn!) This step is where you can decide how hot you want the salsa to be. Mild should be 3-5 habaneros, medium 6-10, hot 10-15, and extremely hot 15+. (See note below for multiple levels.) Add salt and pepper to taste, I would recommend a tablespoon of each. Let the mix simmer for 1 hour. Prepare the fresh cilantro and parsley by chopping them into fine pieces. These will burn if you add them now. Wait until you have simmered the salsa for 1 hour, then add them and stir with the heat off just before canning. While you wait for the salsa, prepare your canning jars by sanitizing them in a solution or running them in your dishwasher with the heated dry cycle on. Begin boiling water in your canning pot. Once ready, ladle the salsa into the jars leaving a 1/2” space of clearance from the top of the jar. Carefully put the self-sealing lids on the jars and place into the canning pot of boiling water for 45 minutes. Remove the jars, let cool, then label and store your salsa until you are ready to enjoy! Cheers!

NOTE: For multiple levels, add additional habaneros as you jar the salsa. If you split the batch in two, add half the recommended amount of habaneros to your second portion of the batch. Example: For half medium and half hot, start with 6-10 habaneros for the entire batch. After canning the first half, add only 2-3 habaneros to the second half of the batch.