What Is This "SIdemeat" And What Do I Do With It?

[silas sparkhammer]

Google isn't helping me with this. Is it fatback? Salt pork? slab bacon? Unsmoked bacon? What's the best use for this product?

The label says "cured with sugar, salt, pepper, sodium nitrate, sodium nitrite"

[j8715]

Did you get it from the 1920's??

I don't think I've ever seen the word "sidemeat" outside of the "Grapes of Wrath"

[silas sparkhammer]

Culpeper, VA :)

I may fry it up with some roadkill possum and poke salad before heading off for a long day at the moonshine still.

It says "sidemeat" right on the label. That must be a regional term for salt cured pork belly.

[splatgirl]

Unsmoked bacon. Is yours sliced? If not, treat it like pork belly. I had a couple of packages that were sliced. I candied them by coating in a lot of brown sugar and baking sort of low and slow to let the fat render a little and get crispy. Then I had to restrain myself from eating it all. A lot of it just got eaten. It also made an excellent salad garnish when I chopped it up.

[silas sparkhammer]

Thanks splatgirl. It's not sliced.

I put a 2 oz chunk of it in a pot of black beans I was making, with an onion, and I wasn't entirely pleased with the result. I'll have to try your idea.

[splatgirl]

for what you used it for you'd want something smoked.
You have pork belly, more or less. Be happy and find yourself some patience and an awesome recipe. The Momofuku one is on my list if I can get my butcher to cooperate next time I do a pig. I asked for the whole, uncured belly but I ended up with sliced side pork. I guess small country butchers aren't caught up with the whole hipster butchery thing yet. If ever.