It is pork fat – belly or fatback – cured with salt. This food is popular in Italian, French, American, Slavic cuisines, and many others.
In traditional American cuisine, pork fat used in old Boston baked beans recipes. Pork fat and beans are a popular combination in American cuisine.
Salted fatback or pork belly also adds to vegetables, cooked in water. It generally is cut and rendered before use.
In other ethnic cuisines salt pork also popular. In French cuisine, it called a lardon (or lardoon). It is a small strip or cube of pork fat or fatty bacon. Lardon used to flavor foods and salads. Lardons never smoked and made from fat, cured with salt.
Traditional French dishes with lardon: tartes flambées, beef bourguignon, quiche Lorraine, omelette with potatoes, coq au vin.
Salo – is a traditional East Slavic food. It is cured slabs of fatback, with or without skin. Especially famous in Ukraine.
Pancetta – Italian salumi made of salt-cured pork belly meat. Pancetta is typically added to soups and pasta.
Italian Salt Pork – Ancient Roman Dish
Also from Italy came to us famous Lardo – cured pork. It used to be thought of as a food for the poor, but now it is a delicacy. The Tuscan village of Colonnata is particularly famous for lardo. Traditionally, this Italian dish used large marble tubs. It has been made there since Roman times.
Maybe you don’t know how to make lardo. Lardo recipes and the process of salting are simple. First, the container is thoroughly cleaned, its inner walls are rubbed with garlic. The bottom always covered with a thick layer of salt mixed with spices and herbs.
The main set of spices for pickling fat contains rosemary, garlic, and black pepper. The flavor changes by adding different spices.
Pieces of pork fat are stacked in dense layers. The space between pieces is plentifully poured with salt and fragrant herbs.
It is cured in spices and salt and is stored for many weeks.
You might think that lardo is greasy and heavy as it is made from fat, but it isn’t. It has a creamy and mild flavor.
PrintSalt pork in an Oak Barrel
On an oak barrel for 5 liters, you need to take 3 kg of pork belly or fatback.
The most favorable for a pork fat salting process will be a temperature of 2-4 ° C. If the temperature is higher – the product may deteriorate; if it is lower, the fat is salted slowly and unevenly.
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 20 minutes
- Total Time: 35 minutes
- Yield: 3 kg 1x
- Category: Snack
- Cuisine: Ukrainian
Ingredients
- 3 kg pork belly or fatback
- 0.4 kg salt (+ for empty spaces in the barrel)
Instructions
- Divide pork fat into medium square pieces abundantly rubs salt on all sides. Salt must be coarse (on 10 kg pork fat, not less than 1 kg salt).
- At the bottom of the barrel, covered with a salt layer, put the pieces of fat. The pork skin should be down. The next layer of pork fat is placed upside down.
- Fill empty spaces with fat cuts or cover with salt.
- Do not worry that pork fat can be salted too much – it absorbs only the amount of salt that is needed.
- On top of the filled barrel with fat put the oppression and put it in a cool room. After 3-4 weeks, the pork will be salted.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 0
- Calories: 898
- Sugar: 0
- Sodium: 0
- Fat: 0
- Saturated Fat: 0
- Trans Fat: 0
- Carbohydrates: 0
- Fiber: 0
- Protein: 0
- Cholesterol: 0
Keywords: Salt pork
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[…] One of the most famous ways of preserving meat or fat for a long time is salting. There are so many recipes for salt pork in different cuisines. You can read more here: What is Salt Pork? […]