Guinness cheese macaroni

6 | 45 | Medium

BY: ANDREA ALDEN

I'm not a big Guinness fan. As a drink it's a bit too thick and strong for me. However, as an ingredient in my Guinness cheesecake, Guinness barbecue sauce and other recipes, it adds a fuller flavor and tastes truly delicious. By adding Guinness to Macaroni Cheese, I created a whole new dimension of flavor that makes Guinness Macaroni the best Macaroni Cheese ever. (Yes, I know, I say that with every new cheese macaroni recipe. But this time I really mean it!)

INGREDIENTS

450 g of your favorite pasta for cheese macaroni
2 tbsp butter
2 tbsp flour
1 tsp Dijon mustard
Pinch of garlic powder
1 1/2 cups or 3/4 cup + 3/4 cup heavy cream, milk, heavy cream
1/3 cup of Guinness
3 1/2 cups shredded strong Irish cheddar cheese (try Isle of Mann, an aged cheddar)
3/4 cup grated Gruyère cheese
Salt and pepper to taste
1 cup sourdough breadcrumbs (if you can't find them, just make your own by making croutons and crushing them when toasted)
1 tbsp parsley
1 tbsp butter, liquid

PREPARATION

Prepare your giant piece of pork belly, remove the skin and cut it in half. This should give you two portions of 3kg each. This also fits better in the large freezer bags with zip closures.
To make the pure bacon, combine the sugar, molasses, salt, bone meal and curing salt in a bowl. Place half of this mixture on the first pork belly and massage it into the meat. Turn the cured pork belly over and massage the rest of the cure into the meat. Make sure you brine the sides and ends too. (If you just want plain bacon, double the recipe in quantity and repeat this process.)
To make maple bacon, combine salt, brown sugar, curing salt and maple syrup in a bowl. This results in a sticky substance, not like the pure pickling mass. Massage half of the mixture into one side of the second pork belly and the other half into the other side of that pork belly. (Double the recipe in quantity and repeat this process if making maple bacon only.)
Place both pork belly portions into the oversized freezer bags. Close them tightly and put them in the fridge.
Turn the bags of bacon daily for 5 to 7 days. You will observe fluid collecting in the bags. That's exactly what you want. The curing mixture draws the moisture out of the meat. This causes supermarket bacon to stretch and curl up. At the end of the curing time, the pork bellies should be firm.
When you are ready to cook the bacon, remove the pork bellies from the bags and discard the excess liquid. Rinse and dry the pork bellies and set aside until the grill is ready.
Preheat the grill to 95 °C and fill the Napoleon smoking pipe with smoking chips or preheat the Apollo smoker to 95 °C. Smoke the bacon for 3 to 6 hours, until a meat thermometer inserted into the thickest part of the meat registers 145°F.
Let the pork cool and cut into slices. Divide the slices into as many portions as you want family members to eat. Wrap the portions in aluminum foil or in smaller zip-top freezer bags. Freeze everything. Thaw each portion before frying.

Homemade smoked bacon will be the best bacon you've ever eaten. Unless you A) don't like bacon or B) have no taste. I mean, we gave samples to friends and family members - even though we were very sad when it was all gone - and they all couldn't believe it! What they had thought was bacon for years was not even third rate in comparison. At least that's what they said. Do it yourself. Try it. You will love it.

Grill community

Become part of our grill community and share your experiences on social networks.
Show us your favorite grilled dish on our Men's Life, Grills Facebook and Grills Instagram pages.

Our hashtags:

#men's life
#NapoleonGrill

source: