Tasting Notes from the Edge

Small Paris Bistro

The first and only time I have ever been to Paris was a Valentine’s Day trip four years ago. We were visiting family in London and decided to take the train to Paris for three days and four nights. We stayed in a little hotel in Saint Germain and both of us were suffering from a light bout of stomach flu. Not ideal for a visit to one of the culinary capitals of the world.

The first night we spent walking around with Jeanne acting the part of the tour guide due to her 15 month residence in the city. As the night got later and the temperature dipped we headed into a bistro near the Pont Neuf for a glass of wine and maybe a small bite to eat.

The bistro was obviously a tourist place as it was completely empty at 9:30 at night, not a good sign in Paris. However, after Jeanne spoke to the waiter in French and I added a poorly pronounced word or two remembered from high school french class, he took pity on us and brought us 2 glasses of wine and a Croque Monsieur. Absolute heaven! A grilled ham and gruyere sandwich topped with bechamel sauce. So simple and so delicious and one of my most enduring memories of Paris.

That brings us in an around about way to the fourth challenge issued in the Charcutepalooza - Meat for a Year festival - Canadian Bacon or as we call it in Canada – Back Bacon. This challenge involves brine curing a pork loin for 48 hours and then smoking it over low heat for 2-3 hours in order to achieve an internal temperature of 150º F.  I won’t write out the recipe but you can find it here at Michael Ruhlman’s site, the author of Charcuterie: the Craft of Salting, Smoking and Curing.

We knew that the brining process worked perfectly as we had brined two pork loins and had used the first one for Peameal Bacon which you can read about in a previous post. So knowing we had a good base it was all up to the smoking to make an amazing Canadian Bacon.

For the smoking we used our natural gas barbecue and attempted to set it to 200º F. This involved a bunch of fiddling around before hand as with one burner set at low it was about 180º and it took about 90 minutes to get the setting for a stable temperature. I use a grill top thermometer to measure since it was 40º outside and windy so my BBQ thermometer was not very accurate in those conditions.

With that out of the way, I made a number of wood chip packets out of a mixture of wet and dry apple wood chips and tin foil. I make the packets big enough that they cover half of the BBQ under the grill so I can smoke and use indirect heat at the same time.

In the end the bacon took the full three hours to get to temperature but man was it worth it! The combination of salty and the natural smokiness of the applewood gave the bacon a much more subtle flavour than I am used to in commercially prepared Canadian Bacon. Also the pink colour of the meat very striking to see when you slice it. Way better than anything I have bought at a store and dare I say as good as many of the artisanal Canadian Bacon I have tried.

Canadian Bacon

Back to Paris…What better way to use the freshly smoked Canadian Bacon than in a the previously described Croque Monsieur. This is a great bacon recipe:

Croque Monsieur Recipe

8 pieces of white bread
8 slices of Canadian Bacon
5 cups of grated gruyere
2 Tbsp of unsalted butter
3 Tbsp of flour
2 cups of hot milk
1/2 tsp of freshly grated nutmeg
1 tsp of freshly cracked black pepper
1 tsp of kosher salt
dijon mustard

Heat the milk in a sauce pan over medium heat until it is steaming but not boiling. Meanwhile melt the butter over low heat and then slowly add the flour and stir well to mix. Slowly add the hot milk while you whisk vigorously to ensure that there are no lumps. Once all of the milk has been added keep stirring as the sauce thickens. You will know it is done when it coats the back of a spoon. Should be velvety and smooth at this point. Remove the sauce from heat and add a cup of the gruyere to the mixture and stir until it is completely melted. Add the nutmeg, pepper and salt.

Turn the oven on to broil and place a rack in the top third of the oven. Toast the bread and then lightly spread the dijon mustard on half of the slices. Layer the Canadian Bacon (Back Bacon for us Canadians) on top of the mustard then put approximately 1 cup of the grated gruyere on top of the bacon on the four sandwiches.

Place the four open face sandwiches under the broiler to melt the gruyere. Then top with the other pieces of toast and smother in the cheese sauce and serve.

Croque Monsieur

This is an easy way to make a dinner sandwich an event.

Filed under: Bacon, Brining, Canadian Bacon, Charcutepalooza, Charcuterie, Gruyere, Recipe, Smoking Tagged: | bacon, brine cured, Canadian Bacon, Charcutepalooza, Charcuterie, gruyere, Recipe, Ruhlman, smoked