Peameal Bacon Brine

Basic Sweet Brine for One Gallon:

Ingredients:

  • 1 gallon water
  • 1 cup kosher salt
  • 1 cup dark brown sugar
  • 3 tbs cure #1 (pink salt)
  • 1 tbsp all spice
  • 1 tbsp juniper berries
  • 1 tbsp mustard seed
  • 1 tbsp whole coriander seed
  • 1 tbsp whole pepper
  • 1 tbsp whole clove
  • 5 whole bay leaves

Directions:

  1. Put all of the ingredients into a large stock pot and bring to a boil to dissolve the salt and sugar
  2. Allow to simmer for 10 minutes and chill (DO NOT put your loins into a hot brine; it will ‘draw’ in the brine at too fast a rate, not to mention that this is just not safe from a safe food handling standpoint)
  3. Place the cold brine (35-38F) covered loin in refrigeration for at least 5 days, but no longer than 8, depending on the size of the loins (you may need to use a non-reactive plate or bowl to hold the loin under the brine liquid; it will want to ‘surface’ if you don’t
  4. You can consider injecting 10% of the raw weight of the loins with the chilled brine to speed the process (I do not; I find that 7 days submerged in the brine is sufficient)
  5. Take them out, let them dry a bit, and then roll in fine corn meal for as much as they can take

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