However I can be very proud about my food, my wife even calls it a bad habbit… I’ve always been careful with entitling a recipe as “The best you’ve ever had”. Simply because that’s a subjective thing every pitmaster/cook might claim and who are we to disagree? I’ve only done it once before as far as I can remember. Guess what recipe? Yes indeed… Smoked Pig Cheeks.
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Are they that good?
I have to say I’m pretty convinced about this recipe. However I like to talk about “how I like my food”, I have to admit I’m mostly somewhat insecure about it. Since half of the fun in cooking comes when you see people enjoy what you’ve prepared with love, it’s always a bit frightening. My wife will agree I’m not the easiest on this point. I try to hold my horses on this small side of me. But these smoked pig cheeks were battle tested and approved twice now. So I could safely say they are now! So that’s why I decided to share them again in a serious post with better pictures now.
Smoked pig cheeks: the secret ingredient
To me cooking with love is cooking with time and patience. I’ve mentioned these secret ingredients before but we can’t get enough reminders. These pork cheeks were prepared in several stages. First they have been brined in a dry salting cure. 4 Hours of patience will improve both the flavor of the smoked pig cheeks and their structure. The salt cure extracts some juices out of the meat and replaces them with the spices you added in the cure. Your cheeks will get firm and perfect for smoking! Don’t worry they won’t dry out, but make sure you rinse them well after the brining session or you’ll end up with some pretty salty cheeks.
Besides the dry cure there’s also some patience needed for the cooking process. I’ve made these cheeks inspired on the “321 method for ribs“. But just like for spareribs I’ve chosen to reduce the time by each stage. I started by smoking the pig cheeks for about 1.5 hr. in my smoker. Afterwards I’ve put them in a baking tray with some whisky, apple juice and a bouquet garni for an hour. The 3th stage is unpacking the smoked pig cheeks and cook them unpacked for the last 45 minutes. Basting on minute 15 and 30. Before serving I’ve sprayed them with some white wine vinegar and grilled for a minute on each side.
A late birthday
It has been a somewhat crazy year. I don’t talk a lot about negative things… It’s hard to share it with the ones I love so I won’t openly talk about it over here. Plus I believe we should give enough attention to the good things in life too. That’s exactly why I still wanted to invite some friends to share some food. I have to admit celebrating right before Christmas (my birthday is in march) is not that bad. We had a great time drinking some beers and preparing our belly for the big meals. These smoked pig cheeks were served along the Smoked Chili where I added pulled pork shoulder. Before the main course I made some baked brie with cranberries and pulled turkey nachos (recipe might follow but no pictures were taken).
Awesome presents!
Since my friends know quite a lot about smoking and BBQ too and some of them can be critical in a constructive way I think I can believe them when they said the smoked pig cheeks were something to be proud of. I’m glad they liked the food since they got me some pretty awesome presents. Those following my instagram for instance might have noticed my recent baking obsession. The reason is the book I got “Larousse book of bread” by Eric Kayser. I also got the awesome book “Heston Blumenthal at Home” a lot of awesome beers and a book cheque to buy “Over worst” from Meneer Wateetons (dutch only). I guess you understand why it was important to serve a good meal?
Anyway I had an awesome time cooking and serving this meal. I hope you understand why I need you to put this on top of your bucketlist. You won’t regret! If you’d like to give a late birthday present too, leave a comment or share with your friends. I would be grateful. [amd-yrecipe-recipe:60]
This sounds like one of those exotic items about which I’d be apprehensive about only because it’s unusual to me, but then it’d turn out to be amazing. They certainly look delicious.
They truly do Jeff! I can honestly say they are my favorite part of meat. 🙂