For my spinach salad recipe (which we took to Paige and Greg’s house for Thanksgiving), I needed to cook a pound of bacon. I didn’t feel like doing batch after batch in a pan, so I cooked it in the oven. So easy!
You know that pre-cooked bacon you can buy in the store? You could do that yourself this way — it comes out differently than when it’s cooked in a pan. It’s not all wavy, and I cooked it long enough so that it wasn’t chewy at all, but nicely crispy. This is also a great way to make homemade “bacon bits” (Just put them in a plastic baggie after they’re cooled, and it’s super-easy to crush them into tiny bits. It basically shatters.) for putting on baked potatoes, in soup, on salads, in omelets, or wherever you want.
How to Bake Bacon
Preheat your oven to 275 degrees Fahrenheit. Some people do it on a higher temp, but I prefer to cook it more slowly at a lower temperature.
Place cooling racks on your baking sheets. I actually made a double-decker of cooling racks, and it worked perfectly.
Lay out your bacon on the racks, making sure the slices don’t overlap.
Bake about 30 minutes, then check the done-ness. I usually bake mine longer (unless it is very thin) because I like it very crispy.
When it’s as done as you want, remove it from the oven, let cool right on the racks, then remove to store, use, or crush.
Perfect!
16 Comments
I alway cooked it on the stove. I love bacon. I have to try this now.
Thanks
You’re welcome! Enjoy your bacon. 🙂
I’m looking for a homemade bacon bits recipe for tonight, so I’m preheating the oven now! Hope they come out as well as yours did!
I also have baked bacon for years using Alton Browns Method. I use thicj cut applewood smoked bacon and there is nothing like it. Yummy.
I love bacon baked! I had the urge to try it almost 2 yrs ago when I was pregnant and got hooked immediately. It tastes so much better & you don’t have to stand watch over the stove. I love mine with brown sugar on top. Nom nom nom!
Definitely the best way to cook bacon! My husband and I can’t eat an entire pound at a time (well, I supposed we *could*…), so after I’ve cooked the whole package, I put the rest in the freezer. Then I have ready-bacon for sandwiches, baked potatoes, etc. Just re-heat in the toaster oven or microwave.
I love baking bacon. I save the drippings in the baking sheet for homemade hashbrowns or gluten-free gravy. Yum!
You can also sprinkle a bit of brown sugar or a little maple syrup on them and make “bacon candy”
It’s addicting.
I still leave comments on LJ sometimes since I get your ‘feed’. Do you ever check there?
no, I never do. 🙁 If you leave comments on LJ it won’t send me email notification because a person can’t take “ownership” of a feed like they can with a journal. So unfortunately, if you comment there, you’re just commenting for other LJ readers to see it if they click.
I think the link to each post shows up at the bottom of the entry on LJ, so it should be really easy to click through to leave a “real” comment I’ll see.
I don’t want to sound completely evil, but really, the directions to cook bacon in the oven are usually printed right on the package. 🙂
However, using a baggie to crush it up sounds much easier than a knife and cutting board.
Are you serious??? I guess I have never read the bacon package. Usually my husband unwraps it, cuts the bacon in half, and puts it in a container in the fridge (raw) so we can make a piece or two at a time. This time when I did it all, I threw away the package immediately. hahaha.
I will have to look the next time I have a package, and see if it’s on ours!
My God. I love bacon!
Mark suggested doing this in the oven, but it is at a lower temperature and left for 2 hours. It was the most fabulous bacon my family and I have EVER had! It’s a great way to premake bacon for eating later. Like Sofi does at her house, she has a “bacon drawer”!
oh my goodness… that sounds awesome. low and slow is the way to go. I can’t believe some people say to do it at like 400 for 5-10 minutes. That’s just ridic.
I’ve yet to try Mark’s ‘low and slow’ version, but I’ve been baking bacon for years per Alton Brown’s directions. I cook it at 400 (putting it in for the pre-heat, too) and it still takes 30-40 minutes. I cook a whole pound on a Pampered Chef stone baking/bar pan and we rarely have any leftover after breakfast. I save the bacon grease for cooking. I don’t use a rack since my cooling racks are non-stick and I don’t want to cook on them…the bacon cooks in the grease just like on the stove but without the attention/time or mess. 🙂
YUM
Brilliant! Why didn’t I think of that? Thanks for sharing!!!