How to Make Hickory Maple Pepper Bacon From Scratch
The only thing that’s better than bacon is HOMEMADE bacon! You need only a few ingredients, time to cure it, and an oven!
- Prep Time: 10 minutes
- Cook Time: 2-3 hours
- Total Time: 3 hours
- Yield: about 100 slices of bacon
- Category: curing meat, homemade bacon, bacon in the oven
- Method: oven, smoker
- Cuisine: bacon, appetizer, pork
Ingredients
- 10 pounds pork belly, skin removed
- 3/4 cup light brown sugar, packed
- 1/3 cup sea salt
- 2 Tablespoons freshly cracked black pepper
- 1 1/4 teaspoons Hoosier Hill Pink Curing Salt
- 1 teaspoon Hoosier Hill Hickory Smoke Powder
- 1/3 cup real maple syrup, divided
Instructions
- In a bowl, whisk together the light brown sugar, sea salt, pepper, pink curing salt, and hickory smoke powder. Slice the pork belly in half (so it’s small enough to fit into two separate 2-gallon-sized sealed plastic bags.
- Place the pork belly on a rimmed baking sheet and evenly divide the seasoning mix so it coats all sides of the pork belly. Place each pork belly into a plastic bag and pour half of the maple syrup into each bag. Seal the bags tight and give them a few rubs to ensure that the maple syrup is coating it.
- Place the bags in a rimmed dish/container and place it in the fridge for 7 days. Each day, flip the bags over, massage the mixture around, and place it back in the fridge.
- On day 7, remove the bags from the fridge, remove from the bags and rinse with water. Pat each dry and place them on a rimmed baking sheet lined with a cooling rack back in the fridge for 24 hours. Make sure it’s uncovered.
- The next day, preheat the oven to 225. Remove the bacon and pan from the fridge, insert a meat thermometer into the thickest part of the meat, and place directly in the oven. Bake until the internal temp reads 155F. This should take ~2-3 hours.
- Remove from the oven, remove the meat thermometer, and allow to cool completely. If you have one, place each pork belly into a vacuum-sealed bag and place them into the fridge to chill overnight. If you don’t have a vacuum sealer, you can just place it into a clean plastic bag that seals shut.
- The next day, slice up your bacon (it’s best if it’s ice cold to slice by hand), cook what you want, and freeze the rest.
Notes
*The yield of your bacon will vary with how thick/thin you slice your bacon. On average you will get 10-20 slices of bacon per pound