I’m just going to come out and say it: I don’t think I’m alone in my love for bacon. Whether you put it on a burger, wrap it around a filet mignon or shrimp, sprinkle it over roasted brussels sprouts, or eat it all by itself, bacon brings a little extra something to everything it touches. Can I get a round of applause from my fellow bacon lovers?
The problem with bacon isn’t that it’s unhealthy; it’s that it’s messy to cook. It spatters and pops. Grease flies everywhere. Even when you use one of those bacon-cooking-pan-cover gadgets, microscopic bits of liquified bacon fat manages to get on any surface within an arm’s length of your stove. And then when it’s all over, you’ve got a steaming hot pan of bacon grease to deal with.
After years of trying to balance my love of bacon with my hatred of actually cooking it, I finally found a better way. Not only is it cleaner; it actually cooks the bacon BETTER.
Step 1: You’ll need a baking sheet.
A standard bacon sheet is big enough to fit an entire package of bacon. Hey; if you’re going to do this, let’s do it right!
Step 2: Preheat your oven.
Set your oven’s temperature to 400°F (204°C). This will create perfectly crispy bacon without burning it.
Step 3: Line a pan with parchment paper and lay the bacon in a single layer.
The parchment paper will keep the bacon from sticking and help absorb some of the grease.
Step 4: Put the baking sheet in the oven, wait, and enjoy.
There’s no flipping involved in this bacon-cooking method. Simply wait 15 to 20 minutes until the bacon has come to your desired degree of doneness and – voila! Perfect bacon with no splattery mess. Once it’s cooled, simply hold the baking sheet over a trash can, peel the parchment paper off, and wipe the excess grease off with some paper towels before washing the baking sheet in the sink or dishwasher.
That’s it! Once you make bacon this way, you’ll never go back to using a pan.
