• Pork belly

For the cure:

• 400g salt
• 200g brown sugar
• 60g pink curing salt

Making bacon is all about ratios. Mix together your cure, then weigh the pork belly. You want a ratio of 2.5% cure to the weight of the pork. To get that number, multiply the gram weight of the pork by 0.025. So a 1.5kg piece of pork would calculate as: 1500 x 0.025 = 37.5g of mixed cure.

Rub the cure all over the pork. You want even coverage. Add flavourings – hard herbs like rosemary or thyme work well, as do juniper berries. Put the whole lot in a freezer bag or, at a pinch, a container, and put in the fridge. Turn every day for 7 days. The cure will become liquid and the pork will change colour and shrink a little.

After seven days, turn the oven to 90c-100c. Rinse the cure off the pork and insert a temperature probe into the thickest part. Slowly cook the pork until it hits 65c – this will take around two hours. Remove from the oven and allow to cool slightly before removing the skin – this will be much easier if the pork is still warm but not too hot to handle. Allow to come down to room temperature then put in the fridge. Once thoroughly cold, slice and cook.