Cured pork Loin

TonyA · January 2014

I haven't done a cook worth talking about in a while, mostly pulled pork. But these are quick and worth a look. 2.5-3lb pork loins wet cured basically in a reduction from the Rhulman book. I split brown sugar and B grade maple syrup for the sugars and added black peppercorns and juniper berries.

These are quick to do, about 3 days in brine and about 2.5-3 hrs at 225 grid. Today I was using maple and alder. 6 pounds provided dinner, cold cuts, 2 small hams and 2 steaks. I cook them to 145 deg.

Brine:
8 cups water
.75 cup fine Celtic gray salt
.50 cup maple syrup
.25 cup brown sugar
4 tsp pink salt
Tbsp peppercorns
Tbsp juniper

The steaks would make a wonderful centerpiece to a choucroute garnie with some homemade sauerkraut.

Cookinbob · January 2014

Looks great! Is this essentially Canadian bacon? How do you use it?

Doc_Eggerton · January 2014

That's called Canadian Bacon. It is a great way to use a pork loin.

TonyA · January 2014

Well, Canadian bacon would be dry cured right? And I think less sugar. I use this just like a city ham.

Cookinbob · January 2014

Can you use kosher or table salt instead of Celtic grey?

Terrebandit · January 2014

Neat

TonyA · January 2014

@cookinbob what you really want is a 5% salt solution by weight. Refined salts are all the same by weight. Kosher salt is larger than table salt and thus holds less in a cup measure. Celtic salt or Himalayan salts also have other mineral content that will detract from the amount of sodium chloride by weight.

The short answer is yes, you can use either and you can find measures by brand (not all kosher salts are the same size) all over the web if you don't have a scale.

Or with small cuts with short brine times you can use the old 'it should taste like seawater test' a method I employed for years and I'm still here to tell the tale.

TonyA · January 2014

Another avenue is using tender quick in lieu of the salt and instacure.

Cured pork Loin

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