Recipe: Maple-Smoked Bacon
Prep Time:
1 hour, 5 minutes
Cook Time:
1 hour
Servings:
1 bacon slabs
Ingredients
  • Two 20-ounce pork belly slabs, skin removed
  • ½ cup sugar
  • 2 tablespoons kosher salt
  • 1 tablespoon maple syrup
  • 1 teaspoon curing salt
  • 1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
  • 1 cup maple wood chips
Directions
  1. In a large sealable plastic bag, combine the pork belly, sugar, kosher salt, maple syrup, curing salt and pepper. Seal the bag and massage the ingredients around the pork belly to incorporate. Allow to cure for 5 days in the fridge, flipping the bag each day.
  2. After curing, remove the pork belly from the bag and rinse it with cool water. Place it on a wire rack over a baking sheet and refrigerate until the outside of the pork belly is dry and tacky, 1 hour.
  3. Preheat the oven to 200° and arrange a rack on the bottom and one in the center of the oven. Line a cast-iron skillet with tinfoil and fill with it wood chips. Almost completely cover the pan with foil and heat over high until a steady stream of smoke is coming out of the opening, 3 to 4 minutes. Quickly transfer the pan to the bottom rack of the oven and remove the foil covering the top. Place the baking sheet with the pork belly on the center rack and cook until it has reached an internal temperature of 150°, 60 to 70 minutes. Remove from the oven and let cool completely.
  4. Slice the bacon lengthwise to the desired thickness and cook.