I feel like these could really just be called "cooking tips," since that's what 90% of the tips are about. Stick to your strengths, I suppose.
So! Let's talk about bacon.
I grew up draining bacon of accumulated grease as it cooked, and then laying it on a paper-towel to drain further after cooking. Plus actually blotting the bacon with the paper towels to remove as much of the grease as possible.
I no longer do any of those things. I am now of the opinion that if I'm going to eat bacon, I really can't be worried about the grease. I mean, pretty much the point of bacon is fat.
Plus, it cooks way better in all that grease.
First bacon tip: Lay the pieces out flat. A. has this habit of just tossing the bacon in all tangled up and basically stirring it around, but that makes it hard to cook it evenly and the pieces won't be uniformly crispy. So I lay it flat. I do kind of layer over more pieces than will fit in a single layer, because they shrink so much as they cook that they will eventually all be in a single layer.
Second bacon tip: Don't drain the grease as it renders out. I just let all the fat build up until the bacon is almost deep-frying in its own grease. This prevents scorching and lets the bacon pieces cook more evenly.
Third bacon tip: Don't bother with paper towels; just put it right on a plate. There will be a little bit of grease that accumulates on the bottom of the plate, but at least I'm not wasting paper towels. Because we all know how I feel about that.
Of course, when the bacon is all out of the pan, I save the majority of the grease in a small bowl, leaving the rest in there to fry eggs. I leave the bowl right next to the stove. I don't bother refrigerating it, because we'll go through it quickly enough that it never goes bad.
So tell me, how do you cook bacon?
* Do you remember the dog in the commercial running around looking for the bacon? No? Well, here it is. You're welcome.
4 comments:
I preheat my oven to 350 (for the darker cookie sheet) or around 375 (for the lighter cookie sheet). Then I lay my bacon out on cookie sheets, stick it in the oven, and watch to see when it is done. It cooks more evenly than in a skillet, and I don't have to tend it as closely or as long (since I have 10 eaters right now). Plus I like to cook my eggs on our round griddle because it's easier to flip an egg if there aren't any sides to the pan. But we use/save the bacon grease, too.
I cook it the same as you. And I save the bacon grease too.
Linda
We cook it the same way! I used to bake it in the oven but it makes the oven so hard to clean later. I'd rather clean a pan. I don't save the bacon grease because I never have paper towels or coffee filters for straining it.
samcarter: I don't strain it, either. (Am I the laziest bacon-cook ever? Yes.) If you put the hot grease in a bowl, the blackened stuff will settle to the bottom, so you can scoop the grease from the top and just leave that stuff at the bottom if you want. Although I use the stuff at the bottom, too.
Post a Comment