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To Cure Pork

A method of curing pork shoulder with salt, brine, borax, sugar, red pepper, and smoking over corn cobs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Pork and corn are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,069 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

To Cure Pork

Ingredients

Directions

Salt and brine

  1. Rub the pork meat well with coarse sea salt, placing some salt between the joints.

  2. Place the shoulders at the bottom of a barrel and let them stand for three days.

  3. Make a brine strong enough to float an egg and pour it over the meat.

  4. Let the meat sit in the brine for six weeks.

Finish and smoke

  1. After six weeks, remove the meat and rub it with powdered borax, sugar, and red pepper.

  2. Hang the meat to smoke it with clean corn cobs.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Pork + corntop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,069 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  2. Pepper + corntop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,324 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Pork + meattop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,208 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  4. Pork + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,121 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Meat + corntop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together414 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Pork meat
The main cut that is preserved, becoming firm and sliceable as it cures.
Coarse sea salt
Draws out moisture and preserves the meat by curing it over time.
Sugar
Balances the saltiness and adds mild sweetness to the cured surface.
Red pepper
Adds heat and flavour to the outside of the meat.

The step that matters

Making the brine strong enough to float an egg. Brine strength controls how well the meat is preserved and how much salt it absorbs over the long cure. A weak brine can let spoilage start, while the salt concentration needed is what keeps the meat safe through the weeks-long soak.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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