bacon is best? I use several methods to cook the same bacon with some interesting results. Read on; if you're impatient, jump to the bottom!
BACON IN THE NEWS continues to fascinate me.
THE OSCAR MAYER PROMOTION "Wake Up and Smell the Bacon" (click there) continues to get great coverage. I'm hoping against hope that I get selected as one of the winners of the coveted bacon-scent hardware. (Photo left) Alas, it appears that the app only works on the iPhone, but I'll 'swipe' my wife's, install the app and the hardware, and we'll wake up to her surprise, to the smell of bacon! Not like it hasn't happened before in real life.
THE HUFFINGTON POST comes through again with a funny article entitled "9 Ways Floppy Bacon Ruins Everything". The thesis is that when you add good, crispy bacon to most foods, it inevitably improves them! But when you add floppy bacon, well, you know what happens.
A BACON-FEST called "The Bacon and Beer Classic" is coming to Safeco field in Seattle on May 17. If you hail from the Pacific Northwest, go here to buy your tickets! The Mariners will be in Minnesota that Saturday, and don't return until the following Thursday. This gives the cleanup crew plenty of time to eat the leftovers, and remove all the bacon grease. The Seattle Weekly News says:
"The traveling festival visits baseball fields around the country, drawing thousands of attendees to sample craft beer and bacon-inspired bites from local restaurants. Adding to that already winning combination are performances from local bands and cooking demos."IN OTHER NEWS... the Perfect Bacon Bowl announces restaurant availability... the State of Tennessee makes bacon its state meat... as verified by this state map of state meats... and Bacon Academy marches to quarterfinals... ok, that was just to see who's paying attention.
ON TO THE COOKING TEST!
After receiving lots of notes on the best way to cook bacon, I decided to test four different ways:
Traditional Pan Frying, Baking/Roasting, Bacon Wave in the microwave, and Sauteeing in Water. The questions I was out to answer were: which way tastes better? Which method makes more evenly cooked, crispier bacon?
Background: I used Kirkland's Smoked Bacon, which provided enough strips to cook four or five with each method. Using the same bacon at the same time ensures that it's an 'apples to apples' comparison, which, as we all know, is essential (right, Steve?) I let the bacon come to room temperature before cooking, which is a 'best practice'.
Below is the bacon placed in a shallow pan on parchment paper; to its right is the previously evaluated Bacon Wave. Both have five slices of bacon, ready to cook. The pan went into the oven at 400 degrees for 25 minutes; the Bacon Wave went into the microwave. As you can see, I had to curl the slices around the Bacon Wave posts to get them to conform to the specifications of the device.
Baked Bacon: Not much commentary on the baking bacon as it baked... set it and forget it. I did turn the slices over, half way through cooking. This method cooked the most evenly of all, and produced the flattest, most even coloration throughout - very attractive bacon. Oddly, it came out of the oven very, very FLAT, and then curled up when it dried out - the opposite of the water cooked... hmm.. any Foodies out there who might be able to explain that? Good news: this bacon had the 'cleanest' pure bacon flavor. Total of 20-25 minutes of cooking time (I set the timer but left it in a few extra minutes).
Bacon Wave Bacon: The user manual said I should cook five slices on high for 2 minutes and 55 seconds. Since the bacon is a little thicker than average, I went with 3:00. At the end of the cooking time, the bacon was hardly cooked at all; I added a minute, then another, then another 30 seconds, and finally another whole minute. The bacon took ~6:30 to cook, more than double the user guide - and it still wasn't cooked the way a pan fried bacon would. I'm guessing that the manufacturer is afraid of lawsuits if you cook it too long, so they really understate how much time it takes. This bacon was very chewy, but tasted just fine.
Water Cooked Bacon: This one was the most fun to cook. Here's an animated .gif file as the water started to boil off. The bacon curled and shrunk in the pan very quickly, which was surprising - even before the water boiled away. Interesting how the fat rendered white, floated, and then settled on the bottom of the pan to brown. Once the water was gone, I had to turn down the heat as the edges were cooking too quickly. On the drain towels, the bacon went from curly to flat - strange - but it tasted great and was the crispiest, although a little unevenly cooked. It took a full 20 minutes, as the water had to boil off.
See the picture below to see how messy the water cooking method becomes. Aluminum foil on the stove helps with the cleanup. All the rendered fat goes to the bottom of the pan and browns. Also, more splatter than other methods.
Pan Fried (traditional) Bacon: Here, I simply used my normal method to cook; slow heat starting at room temperature. This was the absolute crispiest bacon of the four, although it did have 'hard' parts. It was also the must succulent, as it suffered from curly edges and 'bacon neck.' Took ten minutes start to finish. No need for a picture.
RESULTS. Here's a little table to help you understand how it turned out. The winner, in my mind? Water Cooked. If you have the time, this tasted the best and was pretty crispy. The downside? Time and the mess. But just take a look at the picture! This bacon is very photogenic! Interesting how each method had a slightly different shrinkage, and definite differences on the fatty portions.
And here is a picture of representative slices, two by two, for your perusal. What method do you think is best? Do you have another method not tested? See you next week!
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