Smoked Fatback is a delicious smoked meat product

Smoked Fatback is a delicious smoked meat product. It can also be added to many dishes to enhance flavor. Its popularity has diminished somewhat in recent years due to the negative image that any fat products have on a modern health conscious consumer. Unfortunately very few low cholesterol dieters know the fact that pork fat is of unsaturated kind (good cholesterol) and that the butter they buy every day is of saturated fat variety (bad cholesterol). The final conclusion: pork fatback and bacon are much healthier than butter. And they taste better :)

1.	meat selection	1. Pork Grade I (Fatback I), 11 lb (5 kg), not salted Meat total : 11 lb (5 kg)	salt	350 g	12oz
	ingredients
2.	curing	Pork fat slabs, with or without skin, about 9" - 11" (24 - 28 cm) long and 3" - 6" (8 - 16 cm) wide and at least 1¼" thick (pork with the skin on) or 1" thick (pork without skin). Keep salt pork at 40º - 42º F (4º - 6º C). When cutting slabs you can choose your own length but make it 3" - 6" wide. Trim out all remaining pieces of flesh and blood, until you have a clean piece of pork. Find a suitable curing container and spread salt on the bottom. Rub in salt into pork on all sides and place in the container skin down. Cover pork with salt on top, rub in salt into the next pork piece and place it on top of the first one, skin down. Put more salt on top. Don't go any higher than 20" (50 cm). After 7 days remove pork pieces, rub in more salt into pork pieces, add more salt between them and on top. The pork should be everywhere well covered with salt. The container should remain in a cool 40º - 42º F (6º - 8º C) and dark place for 1 - 2 weeks. Total salt curing time 2 - 3 weeks. After 1 week of curing when rearranging the pieces, you may rub in some favorite spices of yours.
3.	grinding	none
4.	mixing	none
5.	stuffing	none
6.	drying	Shake off salt of the pork pieces, rinse in warm water, 100º - 104º F (38º - 40º C) , check that they are clean on outside and hang for 12 - 24 hours to dry them out. Make 4 - 5" (10 12 cm) long loops of butchers twine.
7.	smoking	Salt pork is cold smoked below 70º F (22º C) with thin smoke for 2 - 3 days until light brown or brown color is achieved.
8.	cooking	none
9.	cooling	to below 64º F (18º C).
10.	storing	Store in refrigerator
	notes	no cure # 1 or nitrates used. Product not cooked but ready to eat.