Pancetta - Off to the curing chamber

The pancetta has been curing with its spices and salt for about 10 days. It's become pretty firm and the flavors should have permeated the meat fully. Time to move it to the curing chamber.






This is what the pancetta looks like as it comes out of the bag.

The spices get rinsed under cold running water, and then the belly gets patted dry.






Here is the rinsed pancetta. Really pretty uneventful, or uninteresting.
The meat looks darker and definitely feels firmer than it was when raw.





A spice mixtures is made up. For this one I mixed 2 teaspoons of very coarse black pepper, 5 crushed bay leaves, and 1/2 teaspoon of red pepper.






Here is the cured pork belly rubbed with the spice mixture. Really press the pepper and spices into the meat. Put a string through it to hang and that's it. Easy.







Now, for people who don't have a curing fridge, the drying is also very easy. Put the pancetta on a cake rack, and then on a plate, and put it in the fridge for about 3-4 weeks. The cake rack on the plate will allow the air to circulate around it reaching all sides of the meat. If you just put it on a plate, the surface touching the plate will stay wet.

If you do have a curing fridge, put it in there. I put mine in, at about 54 deg. F and about 60% humidity.

Humidity for pancetta isn't super critical since it is quite thin and has a lot of surface area, which will allow it to dry pretty evenly even if the ambient is too dry for other cured meats (like in a fridge).