Salting Pork
Ingredients
Directions
Layer the pork
Cover the bottom of a barrel with 1 inch of coarse sea salt.
Place a layer of pork in the barrel and cover it with ½ inch of coarse sea salt.
Repeat layering pork and salt until all pork is used.
Brine and weigh down
Cover the pork with strong brine.
Pack the pork tightly with the rind side down.
Keep the pork submerged under the brine using a clean inner cover and stones.
If scum forms, pour off the brine, scald it, and add more salt.
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
What each ingredient does
- Coarse sea salt
- Draws out moisture and preserves the pork by inhibiting spoilage microbes.
- Pork
- The main meat being cured and preserved in the salt and brine.
- Strong brine
- Keeps the pork fully covered in a salty liquid so it cures evenly.
The step that matters
Keeping the pork submerged under the brine. Any pork left above the brine can spoil or grow mold, because salt only protects the meat when it is fully covered. Weighting it with a clean inner cover and stones keeps every piece under the liquid.
“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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