Salt Pork
Salt Pork is prepared exactly the same as for beef. It can also be prepared in the modern French way of curing petit salè (dry cure), although with keeping, the dry salt runs to brine anyway.
For the classic petit salè, start by making flavored salt:
2 ¼ lbs. (1kg) sea salt
12 peppercorns
4 cloves
4 bay leaves
1 teaspoon juniper berries
1oz (25 grams) white sugar
The leaves from 2 sprigs of thyme
Crush the pepper, cloves, bay leaves and juniper berries and mix well with into the salt with the sugar and thyme leaves. This gives sufficient for up to 12lbs (6kg) of pork. The classic French pork meat is belly, but if you consider this to be too fatty for you, you can use chops.
Place several handfuls of the salt mix into the bottom of a large container. Rub more into the pork and layer it into the container with plenty of salt between the layers. Cover it and leave it in a cool place for at least a week, but for anything up to two months.
When you want to eat the pork, take out as much as you want, rinse it off and boil it in plenty of unsalted water for 40-60 minutes, depending on the thickness of the meat. Taste the water after 10 minutes; if it is over-salty, throw it away and refill the pan with fresh. If the pork has been in the salt for more than two months, steep it for a couple of hours in fresh water before changing the water and cooking it. Serve it how with sauerkraut or cold with salad.
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