My First Attempts At Curing Bacon My interest in curing, smoking, preserving and pickling foods began a few years ago. Various events along the way such as eating cured brisket in North Carolina (http://bit.ly/14jf7rC), regularly popping up to our local farm shop to buy various items and a couple of attempts at Gravadlax fed (awful pun I know) this interest. So where could I start without burning holes in the bottom of large pans or setting fire to the house by building a cold smoker that becomes a hot smoker? The answer seemed to be to try and cure some bacon. First attempt: After reading up about the quantities of salt, sugar and saltpetre (seemingly known as Prague Powder) that needed to be carefully blended I opted for the easy way out by buying ready mixed cure from Amazon (http://amzn.to/19xoPHG). I bought a cheap piece of belly pork and rubbed the required amount of cure into it before placing it in a sealed container and then putting it in the fridge. There it stayed for five days (couldn't wait any longer!). During this time the curing process was clearly in action as fluid was collecting in the bottom of the container. After the five days the 'bacon' was removed from the container, washed to remove any residues of the cure and patted dry. It was then sliced before being dry fried - no oils used at all. The slices were flipped regularly to prevent burning, 'flipped regularly' is a euphemism for manically turning the slices over every 15 seconds or so as I didn't want to see my first bacon get burned to a cinder!! So how did it taste? Just like I remember bacon as a child, slightly salty and wonderful to eat. I know that it seems de rigeur to have a photo on a page such as this but suffice to say that the remaining slices of bacon didn't last long enough to pose. Second attempt: The whole process was repeated, but this time it was only left for four days to cure so that I could taste the difference of the effect of different cure lengths. The result was a sweeter less salty version. I think that the kids preferred this but personally I prefer it slightly saltier. The next attempt will use a six day curing period, let's see how this affects the taste.