Bacon

Pancetta is the salted raw belly of pork, exactly the same cut as bacon. Pancetta arrotolata is commonest abroad, shaped like a long sausage, with the fat belly wrapped round the lean back meat. Some pancetta is smoked – affumicata. Pancetta is the basis of many Italian dishes, cubes being fried with onions and probably other vegetables and herbs, until the onion softens. It’s used so often that this ‘soffritto’ is often just listed as an ingredient in Italian recipe books.

Streaky bacon can be substituted (though bacon in northern Europe contains water, unlike pancetta), or cubed fat cut from ham or gammon.