Modern Cookery
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Before hanging, cover the flesh side with bran or sawdust to create a crust.
Hang the flitch of bacon in a dry place, avoiding rain.
Smoke
Smoke the bacon over a constant fire for about a month.
Store in ashes
In a box or chest, layer wood ashes and place the flitch inside, covering it with more ashes.
Ensure the storage place is dry; dry out damp ashes before reusing.
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
- Bacon flitch
- Forms the meat that is cured and flavoured by smoke over the month.
- Bran or sawdust
- Forms a crust on the flesh side that helps the surface take on smoke.
- Wood ashes
- Keeps the flitch surrounded and dry during storage.
The step that matters
Keeping the ashes dry. Damp ashes can spoil the meat and hold moisture against it, so the storage box must stay dry and ashes must be dried before reuse.
“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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