Name: Home-Brined Pork
Ingredients: ⅔ cup (packed) light or dark brown sugar; 4 to 5 pounds boned fresh pork (shoulder, loin, or leg); 1 teaspoon whole allspice berries; Coarse (kosher) salt as needed; Water as needed; 1½ teaspoons juniper berries; 1½ teaspoons whole black peppercorns; 1 egg, in its shell (to test the brine); 2 bay leaves; 1½ teaspoons dried thyme

Preparation info

Difficulty
Medium

Appears in

Better Than Store-Bought

By Helen Witty and Elizabeth Schneider

Published 1979

About

This is not exactly your most popular store-bought item, but we feel it has a place here as a substitute for the often synthetically flavored, water-filled hams and shoulders that one encounters too frequently in today’s markets.

This time-honored method of pickling meat makes a new animal of the pig. It acquires a totally different flavor and texture from fresh pork—as different as Canadian bacon is from fresh pork loin. As with the other recipes for meats cured in brine, there is