Chapter 602 –Easy Bacon-Style Porkbelly
Author: Eguchi Ren
Eguchi Ren: It’s a little short though
Gumihou: I think Eguchi-san lost track of what he’s building… any way, it’s no longer short after Gumi was through with it. Ho ho ho~ Gumi also made bacon before, so do feel free to send your questions in~
Clonk- clonk- clang- clang- conk!
The sound of construction echoed throughout the mansion.
I must say, Dwarves worked really quickly.
When Bruno-san told me that an entire detached house could be built in 10 days, I had only half believed him. However, it turned out that the entire house could really be finished within 10 days and the interior done in 2.
Right now, they are currently working on building a dormitory for single people. [1] After thinking about it for a few days, I decided not to create a ‘share-house’ style building where toilets and baths had to be shared. Instead, all the rooms would be in the 1DK style with its own mini kitchen area, bath and toilet. A total of 6 such rooms would be built within this house.
Bruno-san had [2] shaken his head when I proposed this design. He muttered something about ‘overly luxurious’ and something else, but I was no longer listening. After all, to a Japanese like me, a bath is not a luxury but a necessity. As for the kitchen area, while not everyone would like to cook, it was still convenient for people to warm up some leftovers for snacks, boil water for tea or something.
“Anyway, it won’t take us 10 days to build this one. Since the interior is identical, albeit extravagant, it would only take about 10 days at most. If you had tasked us to build one of those, it would only take us 3 or 4 days.”
By ‘those’, Bruno-san meant the servants’ quarters that were already here when I bought the property. Still, it was pretty amazing to think that an entire house could be built and furnished within 2 weeks.
“As for this maisonette-type building… umu, I would have to take into consideration the stairs as well as the overall structure… hmmm,” Bruno-san frowned over the rough blue-print that I had hand drawn for him to explain what a ‘maisonnette-style’ building looked like. “I don’t know why you want to have so many entrances, it’s a little troublesome but we could do it in about a month, I expect.”
[2]
“A month!” I was astounded.
“Well, it’s a completely new design. I have to make sure the foundation is sound, the stairs go where they should and maximise the space-” Bruno-san said defensively.
“No, no, I mean, wow, a month is really fast. I’m amazed, Bruno-san!” I quickly said. “It’s beyond what I had expected, very amazing!”
“Hmph, well, I guess…”
Oho, is the Dwarf actually blushing? I handed him a bonus whisky as encouragement, “I look forward to seeing the finished product!”
“You will be amazed, I guarantee it.”
“Haha.”
[2]
Indeed, I felt very confident about leaving all the construction shenanigans to Bruno-san. I had heard horror stories from friends about unethical renovations and construction workers, but I had every confidence that Bruno-san would not let me down.
Work hard, Bruno-san!
Meanwhile, I’m going to take it easy for a while.
By taking it easy, I meant that I was going to use the time to make something that I had been meaning to, but never had the leisure time to do so.
A while ago, I found some smoke chips at [Net Super] on sale a little while ago. It had been a long time since I had last used smoke chips, but it impression was so amazing that I never forgot the taste.
Now, with time on my hands, I thought I’d give it a try again.
So, the plan is to make some simple bacon-style pork belly.
According to the description on [Net Super], to make authentic bacon, the meat would need a week of curing. However, for the simple bacon-style pork belly, it only needed 1 day of salting.
This simple ‘bacon-style’ pork belly is more like a juicy smoked pork, and, according to [Net Super], would be ‘moist and delicious’ perfect for sandwiches, and fried rice and add a touch of flavour to any kind of dish.
When I first saw it, I thought: I got to make this.
Also, cured meat is one of the things that goes really well with alcohol, so, I’m looking forward to that as well~
Ahhh~ beer snack, here I come~!
Still, this so-called ‘Easy Bacon-Style Pork Belly’ cannot be made in a day. Aside from the one-day curing, it had to be smoked for at least a couple of hours before leaving it overnight for the flavour to settle.
Now that I have the time, I can attempt this challenge.
Speaking of which, I had been saving all my Dungeon Pork belly just for this occasion.
Since this would be a major, time-consuming project, I intended to try making using two types of salt for the curing process. The Mercandante salt, which was a little expensive but had been my go-to salt lately, as well as the herb salt that I had bought from the capital.
Also, considering that last sad incident where all the smoked sausages I had made to nibble on as beer snack ended up inside the belly of my (then) Gluttonous Trio, I had gone all out and prepared as many Dungeon Pork belly as I could bear.
In addition to the smoke chips, the other most important equipment is actually a wok! That’s right, that’s unexpected, right?
Hohoho, I am now fully prepared.
Let’s get smoking!
[3]
First, I set out all of my portable stoves in the garden on workbenches I had made with Earth Magic. Of course, I had my stove out as well, but since I intended to make a whole bunch of very delicious Bacon-Style Pork Belly, it made sense to overestimate the amount I should make.
Woah, I didn’t realise I had so many portable stoves… well, all the better. Let’s just buy a few more woks…
By the way, the pork belly has been curing in salt since yesterday, so I’ll be doing the smoking today. Since I used high-quality salt, I opted for the ‘dry rub’ method over the ‘wet brining’ method. Hopefully, the high-quality and flavourful salt will penetrate properly into the fairly thin (about a couple of inches thick) pork belly.
I know that whole smoked bacon usually comes in thicker pieces, but the method employed here is the ‘Easy Bacon-Style’ and not real bacon. So, to add to the speed, the thickness of the meat had to be reduced. Perhaps, once I am more familiar with smoking, I could build a smokehouse and smoke huge racks of meat at once…
But for now, let’s go with the smoke wok method.
That’s right, I will be smoking the meat in a wok. So naturally, the meat would have to be the length of the wok and only a couple of inches thick, so that more of the smoky flavour would penetrate into the meat.
To prepare the wok for smoking, first, place a layer of aluminium foil in the wok. The foil should be large enough to stick out of the wok. Then, place lit smoke chips on the foil. Then, place a net over the chips with the meat on top.
By the way, I found the easiest way to light the chips was to place a layer of unlit chips first, and then drop two or three lit chips on later. That way, the embers will burn nicely. Not to mention, since I have so many woks set out, it’s more efficient to layer the woks with unlit chips first and then drop the lit chips later after the meat has been set up on the wire racks.
Speaking of which, the smoke chips I use today are cherry wood chips. So, I am really looking forward to the result.
Also, in addition to meat, I will be smoking boiled eggs and cheese. Cherry wood smoke chips, or sakura wood chips, are said to be fairly neutral and could be used to smoke all kinds of things, so I might as well take this opportunity to smoke a few other things at once. The fire used to smoke cheese and eggs cannot be as strong as the ones used for meat, so, the way to bring down the temperature without reducing the smoke is to soak some of the chips with water first, before placing the lit chips on top. That way, the embers will be weak, but enough to smoke the egg and cheese without drying or burning.
I really don’t want to open the wok cover to find my cheese melted through the wire racks or my seasoned ramen eggs dried out or cracked from overheating. By the way, the cheese I plan to smoke are the 6p cheese and Camembert cheese [4]. I like using these cheeses because they are fairly neutral tasting and will take in the smokey flavour well.
As for the meat, it’s best to wipe off all excess moisture before placing it on the wire rack and covering it. To prevent excess smoke from escaping, tuck the extra foil paper up and around the edges of the lid. By the way, I bought a few glass covers so that I could watch what was happening inside the woks.
Although, to be honest, with all that smoke, nothing much could be seen.
By the way, the reason why I use the stovetop even with the embers burning is to encourage heat into the wok. I used medium heat for all the food, but turned off the fire after just 5 minutes for the cheese and eggs. I let the heat continue for another 45 minutes to 1 hour for the meat.
I read somewhere that if any water droplets appear on the lid or food, I should pat them off, but, considering the dry environment inside the woks, I don’t think that’s actually necessary. Also, I could not really see the meat until I opened the lid or the until most of the smoke had dispersed even through the glass lids.
After heating the woks for 5 min, I turned off the fire for the cheese and eggs and let them sit in the smoke until the whole thing cooled down. As for the meat, I tried checking it with a bamboo skewer to see if the juices come out clean, but hmm… anyway, if the meat’s not done, I could just fry them in a pan a little before eating them.
Of course, if Fer et al wanted to eat them half-cooked, I guess that’s fine?
“Nice, these are ready now~” I said as I placed the smoked eggs and cheese into my [Item Box]. I have also taken out my magic cooler. The plan is to put all my smoked meats here so that the flavour can settle properly.
Meanwhile, a few of my employees have been moving past my line of smoking woks, but aside from a curious look now and then, none of them said anything.
W-well, I guess this isn’t the strangest thing they have seen me doing? Haha.
Once the meat had cooled down, I wrapped the Bacon-Style Pork Belly with grease-proof paper and placed them into the refrigerator. After some thought, I took out all of my smoked cheese and eggs and placed them in a cardboard box. I will leave these on the kitchen counter overnight. Since the weather is pretty cool now, they should be fine, right?
To be honest, my main worry is that someone will try and eat them before they are ready…
That won’t happen, right?
“I’m looking forward to tomorrow~”
[Gumihou: So… it is unclear whether Bruno had been tasked to build 2 or 3 buildings. There was the maisonette-type building and then there’s the dormitory. However, there’s also the ‘build within 10 days and interior in 2 days’ which… why are you telling me this? I read ahead but could not find any confirmation yet, so let’s leave it at 2 for now. Mukouda can be ‘surprised’ by a 3rd building later if it had to exist]
[1] To prevent inconsistencies, worked this canon information in as ‘Mukouda changed his mind’
[2] Emphasis on this culture clash
[3] The smoking method employed here is actually… very inefficient. Anyway, will mitigate it with some real-world techniques that works.
Also, the technique here mentions using medium heat for 15 min, but then it also said the ‘dungeon pork has to be thoroughly cooked’ and there was even a point where ‘it’s fine after juices come out clean after inserting a bamboo skewer’.
… dude, wut?
In the next chapter, they also ‘fry the meat’.
I don’t know anymore.
Anyway, Eguchi-san doesn’t have much barbecue experience (in the past chapters, Mukouda placed vegetables on the grill first, followed by meat and took them both off the grill together. This would only result in blackened veggies or undercooked meat). So, it made sense that he probably doesn’t have much real-life experience with smoking either.
Gumi’s contribution:
– brining vs dry rub + reasons
– cut of meat + reasons
https://www.foodfirefriends.com/smoking-times-temperatures-chart/#pork-belly-whole
Indoor wok smoking – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HZZVOvhyJec
I’d probably try to re-purpose one of my woks for this.
[4] Japanese cheese – Because Hokkaido is a big dairy-producing prefecture, Japan actually produces a lot of cheese, but the most popular are these two, along with Mukouda’s favourite ‘mixed cheese’
6P – a type of processed cheese that comes in a disk and is prepacked into 6 portions, hence, 6P
https://www.meg-snow.com/english/about-us/history/
Camembert – comes in a wooden little box, this cheese is considered quite luxurious. However, not really that pungent