Burnt ends pictorial...

RRP

Been a while since I bought a couple pork bellies so as to make burnt ends.

I started today with 4 pounds and after trimming the excessive fat I cubed the belly


Then I coated real well with DP Regular Grind


Ready to go on my 250º egg with apple and cherry chunks. Note my upside down garbage can lid as a wonderful "tray"!


2 hours later and into a pan with the sauce, butter and honey - right before sealing with foil.


Ready to come off...


and PREST-O CHANGE-O a bowl of burnt ends!


Not bad...NOT bad at all!!!

SGH

Looks like a big pile of money to me. No pun intended 

JohnInCarolina

Looks good to me, Ron.  Costco bellies?

YukonRon

Thank you for sharing. 

RRP

JohnInCarolina said:

Looks good to me, Ron.  Costco bellies?

Yes, Sir! COSTCO

4TheGrillOfIt

Well done and what timing.  I Just picked up a belly yesterday for this very purpose.  Doing it tomorrow.

jdMyers

I was just watching this on a you tube.  The only difference they wrapped them.with bacon after the original open cook.  Man I bet those were good.

GlennM

Looks  great!  I hope cubing them on the obituary section of the paper isn’t a bad omen 😳

dbCooper

@RRP

Those look great, thanks for sharing.

You did a two step process, smoke then braise.  I've always done the traditional three step method.  Any particular reason you omit the last step of saucing after braising, then smoking for 15-20 min to get a nice glaze on them?

Mickey

Just made bacon yesterday with the help of LawnRanger. My Costco just has sliced pork belly. 

That will be my next pork belly project. Thanks

RRP

dbCooper said:

@RRP

Those look great, thanks for sharing.

You did a two step process, smoke then braise.  I've always done the traditional three step method.  Any particular reason you omit the last step of saucing after braising, then smoking for 15-20 min to get a nice glaze on them?

No - I was just following a recipe and it is a simple 2 step recipe. Besides it was time to eat!

Mark_B_Good

Very nice!!  Don't get your cholesterol checked after eating that, haha.

RRP

jdMyers said:

I was just watching this on a you tube.  The only difference they wrapped them.with bacon after the original open cook.  Man I bet those were good.

Yes, Sir, they were wonderful and rich! 

Wrapping pork belly chunks with thinner pieces of sliced pork belly seems rather redundant! But besides that with all the chunks I got out of that 4 pounds of pork belly then wrapping each piece would add a lot more time or require many hands to get that effort accomplished in under an extra hour. 

lousubcap

Mickey said:

Just made bacon yesterday with the help of LawnRanger. My Costco just has sliced pork belly. 

That will be my next pork belly project. Thanks

@Mickey - I routinely ask the Costco meat cutters for  around 1/2 of the full 8-11 lb belly.  No problem with them doing that and then you don't deal with the sliced offerings.
Worst you can do is they won't and you are not in any different place.  FWIW-

alaskanassasin

I made burnt ends once and thought they were chewy and fatty, I don’t know what I did wrong but I have never tried them anywhere else so not sure what  to shoot for.

RRP

alaskanassasin said:

I made burnt ends once and thought they were chewy and fatty, I don’t know what I did wrong but I have never tried them anywhere else so not sure what  to shoot for.

My guess is that like any other pork cook it only becomes tough and chewy if it was over cooked. As for being too fatty then yes a pork belly IS very fatty and needs some TLC for burnt ends to trim off the MUCH-O excessive fat! I even have found inspecting each cube even after I cut it to see if it would still be better off further cut in half lengthwise. 

lousubcap

@alaskanassasin - scroll thru the below and you may find a few suggestions to help nail the cook:
Here's the base-line recipe many of us use:
http://howtobbqright.com/?s=pork+belly+burnt+ends 
And here's a link to a thread with a slight modification:
Pork Belly Burnt Ends-Malcom Reed with @Sea2Ski's adaptation  
You are in for a real treat.    

alaskanassasin

Thanks guys. I will have to give it another go or chase you guys down some time.

Mark_B_Good

alaskanassasin said:

I made burnt ends once and thought they were chewy and fatty, I don’t know what I did wrong but I have never tried them anywhere else so not sure what  to shoot for.

low and slow.  Cook at 250F for a long time, the fat renders to liquid, and leaves only a bit behind, and the meat gets tender as pulled pork ... 

dbCooper

lousubcap said:

@alaskanassasin - scroll thru the below and you may find a few suggestions to help nail the cook:
Here's the base-line recipe many of us use:
http://howtobbqright.com/?s=pork+belly+burnt+ends 
And here's a link to a thread with a slight modification:
Pork Belly Burnt Ends-Malcom Reed with @Sea2Ski's adaptation  
You are in for a real treat.    

@alaskanassasin

That 2nd link (@Sea2Ski's adaptation) posted by @lousubcap has never disappointed here.  High confidence you'll not see fatty/chewy issues with that method.

Kayak

RRP said:

Been a while since I bought a couple pork bellies so as to make burnt ends.

I started today with 4 pounds and after trimming the excessive fat I cubed the belly



Not bad...NOT bad at all!!!

I think that may be the funniest thing I've read here in a while.

Excessive fat???!! What else is there? If you were to render the fat, there wouldn't be anything but a little red residue in the pan!

Great flavor, god awful texture. 

Legume

Mark_B_Good said:

alaskanassasin said:

I made burnt ends once and thought they were chewy and fatty, I don’t know what I did wrong but I have never tried them anywhere else so not sure what  to shoot for.

low and slow.  Cook at 250F for a long time, the fat renders to liquid, and leaves only a bit behind, and the meat gets tender as pulled pork ... 

@alaskanassasin this.  Slow cook longer.  You can also extend the in the pan part of the cook, just make sure you take them out and do a final cook to set them up a bit. Better texture IMO

lkapigian

Bacon Burnt Ends are a nice change as well, I SV first..This is bacon cured from Costco Slab Belly 
 

alaskanassasin

It’s reassuring to know they are not supposed to be fatty chewy. I’ll try again at the next banquet. 

nolaegghead

alaskanassasin said:

It’s reassuring to know they are not supposed to be fatty chewy. I’ll try again at the next banquet. 

if cooking the bejesus out of it doesn't fully work, try a little acidification of the meat (vinegar or citric acid for example).   Following blurb found about acidification and tenderizing:

Offer and Knight (1988) suggested that one of the mechanisms of pH induced tenderisation of meat could be a breakage of covalent collagen cross-links and of some specific peptide bonds.

4TheGrillOfIt

Kayak said:

RRP said:

Been a while since I bought a couple pork bellies so as to make burnt ends.

I started today with 4 pounds and after trimming the excessive fat I cubed the belly



Not bad...NOT bad at all!!!

I think that may be the funniest thing I've read here in a while.

Excessive fat???!! What else is there? If you were to render the fat, there wouldn't be anything but a little red residue in the pan!

Great flavor, god awful texture. 

I would have said the same thing before trying them regarding the texture.   If they are cooked correctly they melt in your mouth with wonderful porky goodness.   RRP’s look excellent.  If you eat bacon you should adore them.  

 

Kayak

4TheGrillOfIt said:

Kayak said:

RRP said:

Been a while since I bought a couple pork bellies so as to make burnt ends.

I started today with 4 pounds and after trimming the excessive fat I cubed the belly



Not bad...NOT bad at all!!!

I think that may be the funniest thing I've read here in a while.

Excessive fat???!! What else is there? If you were to render the fat, there wouldn't be anything but a little red residue in the pan!

Great flavor, god awful texture. 

I would have said the same thing before trying them regarding the texture.   If they are cooked correctly they melt in your mouth with wonderful porky goodness.   RRP’s look excellent.  If you eat bacon you should adore them.  

 

Surprisingly enough, I've eaten them, and am not just talking out my blowhole. RRP's seemed meaty for pork belly, but that's not a high bar. I also eat a little bacon, and am familiar with that. I'm not even getting into the whole 'extremely bad for your health' thing...

RRP

Kayak said:

Surprisingly enough, I've eaten them, and am not just talking out my blowhole. RRP's seemed meaty for pork belly, but that's not a high bar. I also eat a little bacon, and am familiar with that. I'm not even getting into the whole 'extremely bad for your health' thing...

Speaking of meaty vs. fatty pork bellies AND bacon...I prefer Oscar Mayer bacon and only buy it when on sale. Typically I will stock up with 6 to 10 pounds and select only packages with a nice blend of at least 70/30 meat to fat ratio. There always are a lot of extremely fatty packages in the grocery bins! 

I’m always amazed at people who just will grab 4, 5 or more packages and throw them in their shopping carts without even flipping them over to check the “back windows”which are expressly put in the packaging so you know what you are buying! 

PeteSliver

RRP said:

Kayak said:

Surprisingly enough, I've eaten them, and am not just talking out my blowhole. RRP's seemed meaty for pork belly, but that's not a high bar. I also eat a little bacon, and am familiar with that. I'm not even getting into the whole 'extremely bad for your health' thing...

Speaking of meaty vs. fatty pork bellies AND bacon...I prefer Oscar Mayer bacon and only buy it when on sale. Typically I will stock up with 6 to 10 pounds and select only packages with a nice blend of at least 70/30 meat to fat ratio. There always are a lot of extremely fatty packages in the grocery bins! 

I’m always amazed at people who just will grab 4, 5 or more packages and throw them in their shopping carts without even flipping them over to check the “back windows”which are expressly put in the packaging so you know what you are buying! 

I know! I can’t believe it either!  So stupid!