six degrees of deliciousness

as jane austen (sort of) once wrote, “it is a truth universally acknowledged that a person in possession of a good appetite must be in want of some bacon.”  oh jane, you were wise before your time.  these days, in the midst of the modern bacon revolution, you can barely take two steps without tripping over some new bacony product: bacon doughnuts, bacon candy, bacon milkshakes, even bacon toothpaste.  the latter is particularly baffling to me.  who would want the breath of someone who’d been up all night chugging liquid smoke and making out with porky pig?  i just don’t know.  (jane, any ideas??)

on the plus side, in these times of piggy enlightenment, the standard of bacon available to us is getting higher by the day.  no longer forced to eenie-meenie-miney-mo between oscar mayer and farmer john, we suddenly have an influx of quality cured meats available to us from local butchers and smokehouses; craftsmen who throw words like “heritage” and “artisanal” around like they’re in an episode of portlandia.   and by god, these people know what they are doing!  most of the mass-produced bacon you encounter in the supermarkets these days is like johnny depp as the mad hatter: you know all the pieces are in the right place, it’s still technically johnny, but do you really want to go to there with the white face paint and the orange hair??  no, tina fey, i do not.  but the local, small batch, REAL bacon?  why, that’s “chocolat” johnny:  looks how it’s supposed to look, tastes how it’s supposed to taste, and you just don’t give a hoot if it’s bad for you, because it’s so damn delicious.  done.

now, i’ve always had a bit of a thing for some good cured meats.  i love bacon so much, in fact, that sometimes i just want to strap big slabs of it to my feet and climb into a comically oversized skillet, using a giant spoon as a paddle.  

oh, wait.  that’s already been done.  disregard, carry on…

i’ve long wanted to try my hand at bacon-making, and finally decided to take the plunge after being strong-armed into it by my friend’s 9 yr-old boy – now my new business partner.  he came up with a product name so genius that i can’t possibly mention it here, as it shall be stolen and profited from faster than you can say “mark zuckerburg.”  (what??  the movie told me he did.  and movies never lie.)  michael ruhlman is apparently the don draper of meat-curing (just maybe minus the heroic jaw and the knee-wobbling eye twinkle.  oh my...), so i armed myself with his recipe, headed out to my local butcher, and bought myself 8.22lbs of heritage/artisanal/heirloom berkshire pork belly.  away we go!  time to bring home the bacon!!  

homemade bacon pt. 1 (adapted from michael ruhlman's "charcuterie")

5 lbs(ish) pork belly (artisanal/heritage/heirloom if at all possible)

(here's my 8.22lbs.  i cut it in two and froze the other half for next time.)

1lb kosher salt

2 oz pink curing salt

8 oz granulated sugar

1/2 cup dark brown sugar

mix together the salt, pink salt, and granulated sugar in a large bowl.  this apparently makes enough "basic dry rub" for many bacon go arounds.  (michael ruhlman seems to like to plan ahead.)  

(curing salt is now darling daughter's favourite thing to behold.  i'm sure you can figure out why.)

trim the belly, if it needs it.  put it in a 2-gallon size ziploc, along with 1/4 cup of the dry cure (reserve the remainder for future use) and the 1/2 cup of brown sugar.  press the cure into all sides of the belly, making sure it's coated all over.  here's a peek inside my ziploc of goodness.  oh, baby...

put the sealed ziploc into a snug-fitting dish or tray, then immediately refrigerate.  leave to cure in the fridge for seven days, flipping the bag every other day to redistribute the curing liquid that will slowly leach out of the meat.

after seven days, the meat should be fully cured (if it's firm at its thickest point, it's done.  if it's still a titch squishy, leave in the fridge for another day or two).

and that, lads and lasses, is where i rudely leave you hanging mid-recipe, like a really bad date.  in five days i shall be dragging out my smoker, putting on some snoop dogggggg (seems appropriate), and getting smoky with it.  it had better turn out well.  my 9 year-old business partner is cracking the whip...

amurrrrrican hamburgers

i have a problem with cookbooks.  this has been briefly touched upon before, but let’s dig a little deeper, shall we?  i own 155 cookbooks (the number keeps growing), but they stay hidden away in my upstairs office, out of the public eye, lest people see evidence of my secret shame.  (it could happen.  i’d be the hester prynne of my neighbournood, a scarlet copy of “the joy of cooking” on my chest…) 

i received my first cookbook at the ripe old age of 5. “the usbourne first cookbook” it was called.  and it.  was. awesome.  it opened my eyes to what i assumed was the world.  i’d always loved food, and now suddenly the lovely publishing house of usbourne was telling me how to make it??  my word…  (on a side note, i also owned the usbourne book of “how your body works.”  there’s nothing quite like learning the facts of life through cartoons of robots with extending springs.  oh my…  i'm suddenly blushing.)

so many recipes popped out of this first cookbook at wee teeny jo.  let’s take a peek at her for a tic, shall we? 

goodness.  that’s a lot of britishness for one picture.  anyhoo…  one dish that seemed terribly tempting to that terribly british 5 year-old was the recipe for “american hamburgers.”  you have to understand, to a kid in the late seventies, there was something almost exotic to this enormously large country in which i now live.  i remember opening cans of sausages and beans (though what the bloody hell i was actually eating, i really don’t want to know) and pretending i was a cowboy on the range.  i tawwwwwwked like thayyyyyys and assumed that everyone would know that i was a cowboy.  or a cowgirl.  either way. and apparently the good people of the usbourne publishing house had just as clear-cut of a stereotype.

as we now apparently know, americans not only eat hamburgers for every meal, but also wear enormously large chaps and ten gallon hats at all times.  oh, usbourne.  so come on, pardners, grab your baked potatoes and relishes and let's get crazy with some american food!!

30-years-later american hamburgers…

1lb good quality ground beef, no more than 80% lean

1 egg

¼ onion, finely chopped (not roughly chopped, or people will think you have something to hide)

¼ cup (ish) chopped parsley

salt & pepper (heavy on the pepper)

buns (i kind of like kaiser rolls)

toppings:

sriracha mayo (oh, baby)

cheese (i’ve been enjoying manchego or bleu recently)

greens (arugula, if you’re me)

maybe some caramelized onions, if you’re feeling saucy

pickled jalapenos (because i think life has an exponential "exciting curve" directly correlating to spiciness)

i shan’t insult your intelligence by giving you detailed cooking steps for burgers.  mix ingredients, gently form into patties, then grill each side for a few minutes until done.  top with desired toppings, boom.  make it your own, set it free, and it shall love you forever.  now go defy the fact that it is mid-october, grill some burgs like it’s still summer, and find yourself a robot with extending-springs to share a meal and a glass of red wine with.  done.