Making British Food in the US

Back Bacon

Funny thing about American English is that so many things have different names. What they call 'bacon' is what we call 'pork lard'.

The Brit shops sell bacon for $8 for an 8oz packet. And much of that weight is added water so the bacon immediately shrivels up when it is put in the pan. There has to be a better way.

Following the approach described at the Paupered Chef. I use the brine (wet cure) approach minus the nonsense.

Salt is salt when it comes to brine. Koshering salt is in slightly bigger chunks to drain out the blood from meat and does not have iodine added. But it costs twice as much and takes three times as long to dissolve. Iodine causes meats to oxidize but they sell regular salt Iodine free here.

My approach:

I will pull the first joint out at 6 1/2 days so I can test Sunday morning. If it works I will pull and slice the rest.

Revised recipe

per 5lb meat (2.2 Kg) 5.6g of Cure #1

British Bangers

These came out OK but the cut of meat was not right. Next time, I will avoid anything that might have the slightest amount of gristle.

Again working from the Paupered Chef:

Salt is right but not sure about the spice mix or the casings. Will try natural next time.

The Minion Cake

Roasts

I use the low and slow method with the oven on its lowest setting (80 degrees C) for 'several' hours.

Xmas Pudding

Must be spherical like in the Beano.