Don't Waste Money On Precooked Bacon!

 

Money Can't Buy Happiness. But It Can Buy Bacon, And That's Close Enough

I've decided to stop turning around in the grocery store because it seems like every time I turn around, the prices have doubled. This is especially true for my favorite porky ambrosia and yours...say it with me now... “mmmm...bacon!”

I'm old enough to remember when bacon sold for sixty-five cents a pound. The good stuff is going for upwards of $7 a pound now. You can still get cheap store brands for less, but you usually get what you pay for, you know? I can buy restaurant quality bacon through a restaurant supplier and it costs me a lot less; in fact, I just brought home the bacon – five pounds of it – for about $16. You can, too. There are a lot of restaurant supply outlets across the country that are open to the public. They may not be as convenient as your neighborhood grocery store, but......

And, speaking of convenience, let's talk about precooked bacon. I love the stuff. It's like instant bacon when you want to throw a couple of slices on a sandwich or a burger or crumble it over a baked potato or in a salad. But who wants to spend the time and clean up the mess involved in cooking up two slices of bacon for something like that? Enter the modern marketing marvel that is precooked bacon.

As the package says, it's real bacon, fully cooked and ready to use. Just pop it in the microwave for a few seconds and it's good to go. Because the high salt content and cooking method preserve the meat from bacteria, precooked bacon is shelf-stable in the store and you just toss it in the fridge after you open it. It'll be good for at least a couple of weeks.

That said, if I balk at paying seven bucks for a pound of uncooked bacon, there's no way I'm going to fork over five or six dollars for a measly two or three ounce package of the precooked stuff. There are usually sixteen to eighteen slices of uncooked bacon in a one-pound package. The precooked stuff averages about ten slices per package. No way.

So here's what I do: when I bring home my five-pound pack of bacon, I prep it for freezing via the method I discuss elsewhere on this site. (See “Bacon Is A Terrible Thing To Waste”) But I separate out about a pound that doesn't go right into the freezer.

First, I start my oven preheating to 400° F. Then I grab a rimmed baking sheet (½ sheet pan) and a cooling rack to fit inside. I line the bottom of the tray with foil before setting in the rack just to make for easier cleanup later. Next, I lay out as much bacon as I can fit on the rack, usually about ten or eleven slices. It's okay if it overlaps a little because it will shrink up some as it cooks. Into the preheated oven it goes for fifteen to twenty minutes. The time depends on how you like your bacon. I know people who want it to “oink” when they pick it up and I know people who want it so crisp it shatters into bacon bits when they pick it up. I'm pretty much in the middle of the two extremes, so I start peeking into the oven after about fifteen minutes. No flipping necessary, I just put it in there and keep an eye on it. When it's done to my preference, I drain it on paper towels.

Now, what you have here is – are you ready for this? – precooked bacon! The same stuff they're going to charge you an arm and a leg for in the grocery store. All you need to do now is wait until it cools completely, then lay it out on the same sheet pan (assuming you've cooled and cleaned it) and stick it in the freezer for an hour or two to flash freeze it. Portion it out in single slices or in twos or threes or whatever and wrap the portions in wax paper or parchment paper. Stick the wrapped bacon in a zip lock bag and put it back in the freezer. It'll stay nice and tasty for two or three months.

When you want a quick bacon fix, take a portion out of the bag and microwave it for a few seconds. Or, if you're really super-prepared and all, you can put it in the fridge a couple of hours ahead of time to thaw. Now it's ready for your sandwich, your burger, your salad, your baked potato, your pizza, or you can scarf it down next to a couple of eggs or all by itself. Heat it up or not, depending on what you're going to do with it.

And all the while you're devouring your precooked portion of porcine pleasure, you can smile because you didn't fall prey to the latest time-saving-but-money-wasting marketing gimmick. Win-win!

You know, money can't buy happiness. But it can buy bacon, and that's close enough.

Time To Stop Wasting Sliced Deli Meat

Keep Your Lunch Meat Out Of The Landfill

Some time ago I wrote about a pretty slick trick for saving bacon. (Bacon Is A Terrible Thing To Waste, April 12, 2017) When there's just one or two of you a pound of bacon can spoil before you eat it all, so I suggested freezing it as a means of preserving it. Not too revolutionary a concept, right? But it was the way in which I froze it that was rather unique. Instead of throwing the whole shingled package into the freezer and then having to deal with trying to separate the slices as you need them, I rolled up each individual slice and froze them that way. Using that trick, you can get an entire pound of bacon into a quart freezer bag and you can take out a single slice or ten of them, depending on your needs, with no fuss or effort. Thaw them in the microwave for thirty seconds or so and you're ready to go.

Well, I found I was having the same issue with packaged deli meats. Deli meats go bad quickly once the packages are opened. You've only got a three to five-day window to use it up and as much as I like ham and cheese sandwiches, I really don't want to have one every day for a week. So once again, the freezer is the answer.

Most deli meats are sliced very thin. I knew throwing the whole package in the freezer was going to be as much of a pain as doing the same thing with bacon. So I tried separating the slices into portions. For example, I usually put four slices of ham on a ham and cheese, so I divided the package into four-slice portions, separated by deli paper, and froze them. It worked okay, but unless they were completely thawed, the thin slices tore as I tried to separate them. And since most packaged deli meats are “water added,” they get wet and messy when you thaw them. Okay. Back to the drawing board. I used the deli paper to separate the individual slices. Eh. All that got me was wet slices wrapped in wet deli paper when the meat was thawed.

And then the little light bulb came on: why not freeze the deli meat slices the same way as I froze the bacon strips?

I picked up an eight-ounce package of Hormel Natural Choice Sliced Smoked Deli Ham. I opened the pack and started to work, taking each slice and rolling it into a neat cylinder. The rolled cylinders went seam side down onto a sheet tray and then into the freezer. After about an hour they were set enough that they wouldn't unroll and they wouldn't stick together, so I removed them from the sheet tray and popped them into a freezer bag. I labeled the bag with the contents and the date, and it went back in the freezer. Now I had a nice little bag of frozen ham rolls. Next time I wanted a sandwich, I got the bag out of the freezer, selected four rolls, put them on a paper towel in the microwave for thirty seconds, and just like that, I had the makings for a nice lunch.

According to the USDA, “Lunch meat is safe indefinitely if kept frozen. Use it within one to two months for best quality.” I've never had a package of ham last me more than two months, so I can't testify to the verity of that statement, but it is certainly a better alternative than letting it go bad in the refrigerator after just a few days.

The same method works for chicken, turkey, roast beef and whatever else you get from your deli or packaged meat aisle. I will say this: it works a lot better with prepackaged meat like the aforementioned Hormel product. Or whatever your brand preference might be. Freshly sliced meat from your store's deli is a little more finicky. Especially poultry. Not a lot of water and not a lot of fat. My wife is a big fan of Boar's Head Ovengold Turkey. Let me tell you, that stuff shreds like a mad thing when it's sliced super thin, which is the way she likes it. Can you say “pulled turkey sandwich?” And freezing it the common way only exacerbates the problem. But it rolls up pretty well if you ask your deli person to separate it as it's being sliced and then process it as soon as you get it home before it has a chance to sit in the meat drawer of your refrigerator.

Hey, there's a lot of talk these days about food waste, so why not try a simple method to help keep your lunch meat out of the landfill? I know it takes a few minutes of tedious effort to roll up slices of ham or roast beef or whatever. (Rolling up bacon is extra fun because it's nice and greasy.) But the payoff is well worth the pain when you can just go to the freezer, unzip your Zip-Loc, and have nice, neat, perfectly portioned, mess-free little meat roll-ups right at hand for whatever your needs might be. It's an especially good idea if you want to save a few bucks by buying in larger quantities than you otherwise would. Think Sam's, Costco, or your local restaurant supply store. Instead of shelling out supermarket prices for little half-pound packages, buy two or three pounds, roll it up and freeze it. And you'll have quick and easy sandwiches for a couple of months.

As I wrote before, a great way to (literally) save your bacon can also work for your ham, roast beef, chicken or whatever you want to serve your family rather than your dog or your trash can. Saves food, saves money. Win-win situation. Try it today.

Want Quick, Easy Bacon? Let George (Foreman) Do It!

I Don't Know Why I Didn't Think Of This Before

I have written quite a lot about bacon over the years. It's one of my favorite topics, to say nothing of its being one of my favorite foods. I've written about bacon in general and I've written about specific bacons. I've written about how to buy bacon, how to store bacon, and how to cook bacon. And it's that last topic that I want to address here.

I have previously noted that my favorite way to prepare the porcine ambrosia that is bacon is the simple, old-fashioned way: fry it up in a pan or on a flattop griddle. And for the most part, that remains true. That's the way my mama taught me almost sixty years ago, and it's still the best of the traditional methods. But what about some of the less traditional methods, hmmm?

Microwave ovens and their attendant gadgetry did not exist back when I first slapped a slice of bacon on a slab of steel. Do I have a microwave now? Yes. Do I have a microwave bacon cooker? Yes. Do I insert the latter into the former on a regular basis? No way. The only time I microwave bacon is if I'm in a desperate hurry or if I don't really care that it comes out with a case of chewy, dried-out rigor mortis. When I'm making bacon bits for a salad or a baked potato, I'll nuke up a couple of slices. Otherwise, almost never.

Another new-fangled cooking device is the air fryer, which is actually nothing more than a countertop convection oven. I wrote fairly recently about using this method to cook bacon, and I'm in favor of it. The major drawback is that you can only cook three or four slices at a time. Not too practical if you're cooking for a lot of people.

Now, when it comes to mass bacon cookery, nothing beats the tried and true restaurant method of putting it on a rack on a sheet pan and sticking it in the oven at 400° for fifteen to twenty minutes. You get nice, flat, crispy bacon with no turning or watching or babysitting. Maybe it's just my palate, but I can detect a slight flavor difference when it's made that way. Nothing that's a deal breaker, though. It's way better than the microwave method. Besides, my wife likes it that way and it's certainly easy. So I'm good with baking your bacon, too.

But here's my epiphany, and it's something that's been staring me in the face for years and I don't know why I didn't think of it before: let George do it.

Boxing legend George Foreman first stuck his name on an electric contact grill back in 1994. His “Lean Mean Fat-Reducing Grilling Machine” was an instant success and has gone through many iterations and upgrades since that first model. Which I still have, by the way. It's been supplanted for everyday use by one of the newer, bigger, more colorful jobs, but the original little white one I bought twenty-five or so years ago still works when I plug it in, a testament to its durability.

George (the grill, not the boxer) does all kinds of things in my kitchen, including making great grilled cheese sandwiches. I had recently put him to work doing just that and he was still sitting on the counter drying out and waiting to be put away last night when I got a hankering for some bacon. And I don't know why it took twenty-five years to occur to me, but it did. I was kind of tired, kind of in a hurry, and I didn't feel like hauling out the air fryer or waiting for the oven or cleaning up the griddle. And I wasn't desperate enough for the microwave. So I thought,“Hmmmm,” as I stood looking at George's shiny red surface. I did a quick Google search to see if anybody else had had the same thought. Caspita! Was I late to the party! Numerous George Foreman grill bacon recipes and videos immediately popped up in my search.

Armed with the knowledge that it could be done and how to do it, I preheated my machine, slipped three slices of bacon on the lower plate, closed the lid and walked away to do other prep. I went back two minutes later, lifted the lid, flipped the bacon, closed it up again and walked away for another two minutes. When I returned, I retrieved three of the prettiest slices of perfectly cooked bacon I had ever seen. They were as flat and as evenly cooked as if I had used the oven method, but it took about a third of the time. I like my bacon a little toward the crispy side but it was still nice and tender, not at all like the undesirable microwaved results.

Truth be told, bacon cooked this way still does not have the same.....character, I guess.....as good ol' pan or griddle-fried bacon. But there's something else it doesn't have: excessive fat. After all, that's the point of a “Lean Mean Fat-Reducing Grilling Machine.” The fat was all rendered out into the nifty little catch tray, making for a much simpler cleanup. So, while grilling bacon on a contact grill does not necessarily make it a “health food,” it does offer a nominally healthier alternative to frying. And it's certainly faster, easier, and cleaner.

Now, if this is something you've been doing for years and it wasn't really a big revelation to you, just roll your eyes, say “Duh!” and go read something else. Mi dispiace. I'm a little slow sometimes. But if I've opened even one eye to a delicious, easy, and sorta healthy way to cook that marvelous, magical meat that is bacon, then I've accomplished my mission.

Oh, man! I don't have any of my absolute favorite Benton's bacon in the house right now. I see a road trip to Madisonville, Tennessee coming on. And with a power inverter in my car, maybe I could plug George in while I'm driving and........nah. But don't be surprised if my hotel room smells like (sigh) bacon.

Air Fryer Bacon? Yes! (But With Conditions)

Bacon is the Duct Tape of the Kitchen

A couple of weeks ago, a fellow bacon-loving friend and I were discussing our favorite porcine ambrosia and she asked if it were possible to cook bacon in an air fryer. My immediate response was an emphatic “no.” I said this based on what I had previously read about numerous air fryer drawbacks, one of which is that foods with high fat content do not do well in an air fryer.

According to various manufacturer's troubleshooting guides, cooking high fat foods can result in white smoke emanating from your appliance. This is because fat splatters around in the enclosed environment and gets on the heating element. I had even heard rumors about air fryers catching fire due to high fat content cooking. And since bacon is definitely a high fat food, I just said no, don't do it.

But then I got to thinking. I've never actually tried it myself, so maybe I was being a bit hasty. I Googled the subject and was rather surprised to find scads of recipes for perfect air fryer bacon. Hmmmm. Could I be missing something?

Now, to be sure, not everybody had a wonderful experience with bacon in the air fryer. One correspondent even entitled her piece, “Why You Should NEVER Cook Bacon in Your Air Fryer.” She went on to detail the nightmare scenario of thick white smoke billowing from her fryer and of pools of piping-hot bacon grease and ultimately ruined bacon.

And hers was not the only negative I found. The folks in Food Network's test kitchen, for instance, weren't sold on the process either for basically the same reasons: lots of grease and lots of smoke.

But still, there were more positive than negative responses, so I thought I'd give it a try.

Following the most common directions, I laid a couple of slices of bacon in the basket of my air fryer, set the temperature to 400 degrees and the timer to ten minutes. And I started it up. I took a peek in the basket at about the halfway mark and everything was going well. Lo and behold, in ten minutes, I had two slices of crispy, moist, tender, perfectly cooked bacon. My mind was officially blown!

I'm a traditionalist, okay? You cook bacon the way I learned to do it at my mother's knee some fifty-eight years ago. We had a griddle plate in the center of our gas stove and that's how you cooked bacon. You slapped it on there and turned on the heat. You stood over it with a turner and flipped it a couple of times, and when it was done, you drained it on paper towels and served it up. If you didn't have a griddle, a skillet would do. Yeah, it was gonna splatter and be a little messy to clean up, but that was the nature of the beast. It's just what you did.

Later, when I started doing volume restaurant-type cooking, I learned about the advantages of cooking big batches of bacon on a tray in the oven. I still prefer pan or griddle frying, but I'm not averse to baking my bacon when necessary.

One method I only use when there is simply no choice – or when I don't especially care about taste or texture – is the microwave. I'm sorry, the only thing rigor mortis bacon is good for is crumbling into bits for salads or baked potatoes or something. It is otherwise generally unfit for consumption.

But when you think about it, an “air fryer” is not really a “fryer” at all; it's a mini convection oven. It works by circulating hot air around the food being cooked. Not a lot different than my big wall-mounted convection oven, except it sits on my counter.

A couple of caveats, though, some things to be aware of. Many of the bad experiences I read about involved people trying to make a lot of bacon at one time. They were basically covering the basket of their fryer with bacon. Bad idea. That will definitely produce a lot of smoky grease. If you're going to use your air fryer for bacon, you aren't going to feed a large family. Two or three slices at a time will work. Anything more will likely lead to the smoky, greasy nightmares I cited earlier.

Time and temperature are also factors. My experiment/experience worked well with ten minutes at four hundred. Your results may vary.

One of the variants involves the bacon itself. I don't buy cheap supermarket bacon. There's lots of fat in that stuff and even more water. Supermarket bacon is brine cured: they inject it with water. So when you start to cook it, all that water has got to go somewhere and that somewhere is into your pan where it mixes with the hot fat rendering from the meat and turns it all into a spattering, smoky mess.

Dry cured bacon, like that produced by bacon-whisperer Allan Benton at his Madisonville, Tennessee smokehouse, is much less likely to spatter and smoke because there's no added water in it to negatively interact with the hot fat during cooking. That's true whether you're cooking it on a griddle, in a pan, in the oven, or in an air fryer.

Unfortunately (sigh) I don't always have Benton's bacon on hand. Sometimes I have to go with the product I get from my local butcher or from my restaurant supply house. It's not Benton's but it is several cuts above the thin, watery, fatty stuff you buy in the grocery store. And I almost always opt for thicker slices. On average, a good thick-sliced bacon (1/8 inch) will yield ten to twelve slices per pound. The higher-end grocery store bacon runs sixteen to eighteen slices per pound and the really cheap, paper thin, “bargain” stuff can contain as many as thirty slices in a pound.

So, obviously, if you cook six slices of cheap bacon in your air fryer at four hundred degrees for ten minutes.........you're not going to like the results. The solution, of course, is to buy higher quality bacon, use less of it, and experiment a bit with the cooking time and temperature. Depending on your machine and your product, you might have to go with three-fifty or three-seventy-five. And maybe it will take twelve minutes. Or if your bacon is thinner, maybe as little as eight. You just have to play with it until you get the results you want. The beauty part is that once you do that, you're set forever. Use the same settings and more or less the same product every time and you'll always get the same perfect results.

Are you gonna get some smoke? Yeah, probably. I did at first. In fact, after a couple of minutes my kitchen smoke detector started squalling at me. “Ooops! Dummy! You forgot to turn on the fan.” Once I flipped the switch on the hood, no more smoke and no more squealing detector.

Cleanup was easy. Because I don't use cheap, fatty bacon, there was very little grease collected in the pan of my air fryer. Maybe a couple of tablespoons. I let it cool and solidify and wiped it out with a paper towel. Same for the bottom of the basket. Then it was a touch of Dawn dish liquid and some hot water in the sink and the whole shebang was clean in about two minutes.

So bottom line: yes, you can cook bacon in your air fryer. Experiment a little to see what settings work best with your machine, don't overcrowd the basket with too much bacon, and always use good bacon to begin with. That much is true no matter how you cook it.

And remember two things, both of which I have inscribed in my kitchen: “bacon is the duct tape of the kitchen” and “either you like bacon or you're wrong.”

A New Runner Up To My Favorite Bacon

Head For A Nearby Cracker Barrel

Greetings, fellow bacon aficionados. I come to you today with good news; I have found a worthy runner up to my favorite bacon and it, too, comes from the Volunteer State. Well.....sort of, anyway.

Nothing short of the apocalypse is going to separate me from my abiding love for Allan Benton's porky ambrosia. The bacon produced at Benton's Smoky Mountain Country Hams in Madisonville, Tennessee is renowned and preferred – nay, revered – by top chefs all over the country for a good reason: it's freakin' delicious. Naturally dry-cured by hand, thick-cut, and oh-so-smoky, there isn't a bacon on the market that can touch it.

But.....it's kinda hard to come by. Allan doesn't sell at retail because he doesn't have to. You won't find Benton's bacon at your neighborhood supermarket. It's available at a few specialty places in and around the area where it's produced, but by and large the only way to obtain this nearly unobtainable porcine perfection is to order it online or to make a pilgrimage to the smokehouse in East Tennessee, something I do a few times a year. I never leave Benton's without several pounds of my favorite savory, piggy bonne bouche, but invariably I do run out before I can restock. What to do, what to do? Well, I'll tell you what to do: head for a nearby Cracker Barrel.

Yep, that's what I said; a good ol' Cracker Barrel Old Country Store. Based out of Lebanon, Tennessee, which is located about 165 miles west and slightly north of Madisonville, and with more than six-hundred locations nationwide, there's probably one around an interstate exit near you.

Now, I've been eating the bacon at CB for decades. It's an integral part of my favorite “Old Timer's” breakfast. And I've probably seen the signs proclaiming that the bacon is available for in-store purchase in two-pound packages hundreds of times. But only recently did I actually pay attention to those signs.

I was out of Benton's bacon and Sunday morning was coming up. That's the day I totally abandon my Italian roots and pig out – excuse the pun – by cooking my family and friends a huge American-style breakfast. It's about the only non-Italian meal that I really enjoy cooking and eating. And bacon, of course, is the star. For years, my backup bacon had come from my local butcher who has a special purchase arrangement with Farmland Foods. I used it both at home and in my restaurant kitchen. But lately, that bacon wasn't up to par. I was returning pounds of the stuff that looked like it had been cut with a dull chainsaw. The taste was still okay, but otherwise the overall quality was just lacking. I tried a few national and regional brands from the supermarket with “meh” results. So when I saw the sign at Cracker Barrel one Friday evening, I thought, “Why not? Let's give it a try.” And, boy, am I glad I did!

This is good stuff, folks. It's not handcrafted artisan to-die-for good like Benton's, but for a commercially produced product, it's hard to beat. The first thing I noticed is the uniformity of the cut. This is a big deal because it means all the slices will cook up evenly. It's a nice medium thickness; not so thick you feel like you're munching on a thin pork chop nor so thin as to resemble bacon-flavored tissue paper. All the slices are of a standard length and they stay that way throughout the cooking process. There's not a lot of shrinkage, indicating that minimal water was injected in the curing. At the same time, there's not a great deal of fat rendered off, either. For example, I had to cook some up in the microwave the other day. This is my absolute least favorite way to cook bacon, but it's the best way to get it super crisp super fast if you want to crumble it over a baked potato, which is what I was doing. Normally, bacon cooked in the microwave makes a gawdawful greasy mess. But I was pleasantly surprised that that was not the case here. Very little grease to clean up. This means there's a good lean-to-fat ratio. Best of all, this is bacon that tastes like bacon. It's got a great balanced porky, salty, hardwood smoky flavor. And it's not terribly expensive. As I write this, Cracker Barrel's bacon, when purchased at a local restaurant, is priced about the same as the premium brands you find at the grocery store. And it's worth every penny.

Now, Cracker Barrel may bill itself as an “Old Country Store” and it may have a lot of rustic décor and lots of homey products for sale, but one thing's for sure: there ain't anybody out back butchering hogs and makin' bacon. Nope. Thanks to a multi-year licensing agreement, the credit for that goes to John Morrell, a division of Smithfield Foods. And as far as commercially sourced bacon goes, both are pretty reliable names.

So here's the deal, Lucille: if you want the best bacon money can buy, you'll still need to find a way to tap into Allan Benton's Tennessee treasure house. Go online, go to Madisonville, or go find a friend who's making a road trip and doesn't mind having the car smell like bacon for possibly hundreds of miles. But if you're looking for an acceptable substitute, skip the supermarket and skip on over to Cracker Barrel. Buy a couple of two-pound packages and make sure to employ my tipsfor saving your bacon after you get it home. It ain't Benton's, but it's good. (I wonder if I could get them to print that on the label. Nah. Probably not.)

Yet ANOTHER “Perfect” Way To Cook Bacon – In WATER?

Not Worth All The Internet Hype

Every now and then, some well-meaning somebody attempts, with varying degrees of success, to reinvent the wheel. Take bacon, for example. (And I'll take bacon whenever I can get it!) Seems like you can't turn around anymore without somebody telling you they've come up with yet another “perfect” way to cook bacon.

I'm sorry, but as I've written before and will write again, there is only one “perfect” way to cook bacon: slap it down on a flattop or in a frying pan, turn the heat up to medium, and let it fry. Baking it in the oven is fine if you're making massive quantities and microwaving it is okay if you're wanting to cook it up for bacon bits or some kind of garnish. But if you simply want to lay a few strips of perfectly cooked, crispy, divine, heavenly bacon out on a plate next to its natural companions, eggs, hash browns, and toast, there's really only one way to go.

Unfortunately, the otherwise reliable innovators at America's Test Kitchen have attempted to introduce a “better” way to cook everybody’s favorite porcine ambrosia: in water. Yeah, you read right; the test geeks want you to boil your bacon.

Seems the point of this pointless exercise is twofold: to appease those odd people who object to the smell of frying bacon permeating the entire house and to satisfy the clean freaks who don't like bacon spattering up their stovetop. To achieve these desired (?) results, the test cooks first immersed the bacon in water.

Why would you do such a counter-intuitive thing? According to the test kitchen experts, writing in Cook's Illustrated magazine, “The addition of water keeps the initial cooking temperature low and gentle, so the meat retains its moisture and stays tender. By the time the water reaches its boiling point (212 degrees), the bacon fat is almost completely rendered, so you’re also much less likely to burn the meat while waiting for the fat to cook off.”

And here's how they say you should proceed to accomplish this feat:

“Place the bacon (in strips or cut into pieces) and just enough water to cover it in a skillet over high heat. When the water reaches a boil, lower the heat to medium. Once all of the water has simmered away, turn down the heat to medium-low and continue cooking until the bacon is crisp and well browned. This way, the meat plumps up as it cooks instead of shriveling, leaving the bacon pleasantly crisp, not tough or brittle.”

Since this radical information hit the streets, the Internet has gone absolutely wild with reprints of the technique. I must have seen at least ten websites and blogs touting the glories of cooking bacon in water. But does it work?

I read articles in news.com.au and in Epicurious in which testers were less than impressed. Aussie testers found that bacon cooked by this method wasn't all it was cracked up to be. For instance, as the water began to boil, the lovely, unctuous bacon fat began to dissolve into an “unappetising [sic] white foam” that floated on the surface of the water. The foam eventually disappeared once the water had evaporated, but it left a sticky sludge behind that coated the now somewhat plumper bacon. According to the Australian testers, the water method ultimately produced a drier, darker finished product that was, indeed, crisper, “but in a way that made it less enjoyable to eat.” In their opinion, “It had developed the consistency reminiscent of beef jerky.”

Epicurious testers agreed that the water-cooked bacon was crispy, but found it to be thinner and less salty in the end and recommended that you only employ the “improved” method when you want to use bacon as a garnish on another dish.

After seeing these results, I was ready to dismiss the entire silly “water cooking” notion out of hand. But I knew that in the interest of honest evaluation, I had to try it. So I did.

First off, I usually cook my bacon on a flattop. I learned to cook it that way about fifty-five years ago and through decades of home and restaurant cooking, nothing has convinced me to change my ways. But since that obviously wouldn't work for this test, I got down my reliable old cast iron skillet.

I wanted to be fair, so I didn't use highfalutin specialty bacon like my favorite from Benton's. I just used commercially produced bacon from the grocery store. I laid out two strips in a cold pan and covered it with about four tablespoons of water; just enough to cover the bacon without making it swim. I turned the heat up to medium high (I seldom cook anything at "high" heat) and waited. Sure enough, the water started boiling and the fat started floating in that “unappetising” way noted by the Australian testers. After the water boiled away, there was, indeed, a sticky residue; mostly in the bottom of the pan and not so much on the surface of the bacon. From there on I reduced the heat to medium and cooked the bacon as I normally would until it was “crisp and well browned.” I then cooked a couple of strips the “regular” way and plated both samples for my wife and me to taste and test. Here's what I discovered.

There was considerably less spattering with the water-cooked bacon. But you know what? Spatter has never been a deal-breaker for me. It's bacon! Spatter is part of the process. I learned long ago not to cook bacon naked. I learned to wear an apron and I learned how to wipe down the stovetop. In short, not an issue.

As far as not “smelling up the house,” the water method was a fail. The bacon smell, thank God, was very little diminished by the submersion technique. And, I mean, it's bacon! Along with fresh-baked bread and fresh-brewed coffee, it's one of the most exquisite, delectable, alluring aromas on the planet. What kind of misfit doesn't like the smell of bacon?

When it came to texture, neither my wife nor I could detect an appreciable difference between the two samples. Maybe – maybe – the water-cooked sample was a tiny bit moister, but not enough that I would have noticed if I hadn't been looking for it. And although the test kitchen folks claim “the meat plumps up as it cooks instead of shriveling,” I'm here to tell you my bacon shriveled and shrunk up just as much as it would have without the added water.

And there was a noticeable difference in flavor. The water washed away the salty bite that most people enjoy in bacon and left behind a rather dull, listless taste. Perhaps that's part of what the Aussies meant by “a way that made it less enjoyable to eat.” It wasn't bad. It wasn't like I was going to throw down the test strip and cry, “Omigod! That's terrible!” But it wasn't all that appealing, either.

And the water-cooking method takes longer. Even at a mere two ounces of water, the cooking time increases because you have to allow time for the water to boil off before you finish cooking the bacon in the regular way.

So, all-in-all, was it a worthwhile experiment? Was the new, “improved” water-cooking method worth all the Internet hype? Meh. Not really.

Bottom line, I suppose if you're such a clean freak that a few grease spatters send you into a tizzy, then by all means drown your pork! Make them rashers bubble instead of sizzle! You won't save any time, your house will still smell, and your bacon will be crispy in a way that makes it “less enjoyable to eat” and it'll be bland to boot. But you won't have to waste a paper towel wiping down your stovetop, so I guess that's something. For me, it's back to the flattop or the frying pan. It may not be trendy but it's close enough to perfect for me.

Bacon Is A Terrible Thing To Waste

A Great Way To (Literally) Save Your Bacon

Anybody who's known me more than five minutes knows I love bacon. Even if you don't know me, I guess reading my descriptions of “porky ambrosia” would probably give you a clue. My wife and I wear our “Benton's Bacon” t-shirts to bacon festivals and we discuss bacon in the same way some people talk about wine. We're pretty much fanatics on the subject. That's not to say I eat bacon every day. Actually, I only indulge my passion for my favorite food once or maybe twice a week. And that brings me to the topic at hand: bacon is a terrible thing to waste.

At four, five, six or more dollars per pound, bacon is one of life's pricier indulgences. Far too pricey to watch it languish in the back of the refrigerator. Now, maybe if you've got a big family, “languishing” doesn't really enter the picture. But if you're just cooking for yourself or one or two others, it's often a different story. How many times have you opened a package of bacon, cooked what you needed, and put the rest back in the refrigerator, only to have it spoil before you could use it up?

Because it's a cured product, bacon lasts a lot longer than other meats. But it will eventually go bad and bad bacon is not a pretty thing. But it is pretty easy to spot. Remember that nice pink-to-red color it had when you first opened the package? If it's now more of a brown-to-gray hue, it's gone 'round the bend. Bad bacon will also be slippery, waxy, or maybe even a little sticky to the touch. Really bad bacon will have a bit of a greenish cast. And it will smell “off.” Good bacon will smell like...well....good bacon. If it has a sour or rancid smell, it's too late.

The FDA will tell you you've got seven days to polish off that open package of bacon stashed in the meat drawer. You might be able to stretch that a day or two, depending upon the bacon and the way it's cured. Different cures will produce different shelf lives. But regardless, after about a week, watch carefully for the aforementioned warning signs. Or, you can do what I do: freeze it.

Again, the FDA says one month in the freezer. And again I say that depends on how you freeze it. I wouldn't go hog wild – pardon the pun – and try to keep it frozen for a year, but with proper freezing techniques, you can probably get at least a month out of it. Not that I've ever had bacon last for more than a month, so it's hard for me to say. But err on the side of safety; if you get a really great deal on some bacon, resist the urge to buy twenty pounds with the idea that it'll keep for months in the freezer. It won't.

I'm picky about my bacon. When I can get it, I buy quality artisinal bacon like Benton's. Next on my favorites list is bacon from a butcher shop or the meat department at places like Fresh Market or Whole Foods. When I do buy supermarket bacon, it's usually something higher-end like Wright's. I avoid cheap, fatty, flavorless bacon like the plague. I buy Benton's five pounds at a time. With other bacons I buy a pound or two, depending on how much I need. But although I'm a firm believer in freezing bacon to preserve freshness, I don't just toss a whole package of bacon right out of the grocery bag into the freezer. Why? Well, to begin with, I'd have to thaw the whole package in order to use it, which would put me right back at square one. And the original package is intended to preserve freshness for a few days in the refrigerator. It's not designed for long-term freezing. So first things first; ditch the wrapper.

There are two easy, efficient ways to store bacon in the freezer; flat or rolled up. I prefer to roll mine, but the flat method is good, too. As long as you execute either method the right way.

If you go flat, there are two ways to proceed. You can portion the bacon out by separating the package into quarters or halves or whatever you prefer. Wrap the portions tightly in plastic wrap and then place the wrapped portions in a plastic zip-top freezer storage bag. Fold and squeeze the bag until you've got all the air out of it and then zip it closed – almost. Leave enough room to slip a straw into one corner. Then suck out the remaining air and quickly seal the package. Or you can use a vacuum sealer, but it's not nearly as much fun. Some folks wrap the plastic-wrapped portions in foil before putting them in the freezer bag. I don't, but you can.

Another flat storage technique involves separating the package into individual slices and portioning it with strips of wax paper between the separate pieces. Then you wrap and bag as with the other method.

My favorite way to freeze bacon goes like this: I open the market wrapping and take the first slice of bacon in hand. Starting at one end, I just roll it up. It doesn't have to be a super tight roll, just make a little cylinder. Said roll then goes into a quart-size zip-top freezer bag, tucked down in a corner. I roll up another slice and place it in the bag next to the first one. Try to keep a little separation so the rolls don't freeze together. Proceed in this manner until you fill up the quart-size bag. You should be able to pack in three rows of four slices. Press and/or suck all the air out of the bag and seal it. Then place the quart-size freezer bag in a gallon-size freezer bag and start the process over again. I usually buy two pounds of bacon and I generally employ two or three quart-size bags. Once all the small bags are in place, seal the big one and toss it in the freezer.

Whether you choose flat storage or rolled, make sure you label the packages. You don't necessarily have to write “bacon” on the label – you can pretty much figure that one out – but do make sure to date the package. Time flies.

I like the individually wrapped slices rather than the half or quarter-pound packages because I can just open the freezer and grab as many as I need. If I'm making breakfast for myself, I can take out two or three slices. Five or six if I'm cooking for two. And if I just need one slice to crumble up on a baked potato, I can just get one slice. If you're really organized and efficient, you can transfer the frozen slices to the refrigerator a few hours before you're ready to cook them. Or if you're like me, a few seconds of the microwave's “defrost” setting gets the job done on the spur of the moment.

I can't emphasize enough the importance of getting all the air out of the package. Ice crystals and freezer burn are not good eats and that's what you'll get if you don't express all the air from the package before you freeze it. This includes getting the air out every time you open the bag to select a slice or two. Squeeze the air out before you reseal the bag. Otherwise, why bother? You'll just wind up with spoilage of a different sort.

When it comes to my favorite meat product, I would much rather have it go to waist than to have it go to waste. So, to literally save your bacon, freeze it. No muss, no fuss, and best of all, no waste.  

The Best Way To Cook Bacon

Start With A Quality Product

Can there be any doubt about the allure of bacon? Or the oft repeated fact that bacon makes everything better?

Bacon happens to be the first food I learned to cook. Back when I was about seven years old, I used to beg for bacon at breakfast, lunch, and supper. Finally, my long-suffering mother broke down and taught me how to cook it myself so that she wouldn't have to deal with my constant demands for what the USDA defines as “the cured belly of a swine carcass.” Such an inelegant description of ambrosia!

Since I intend here to instruct on the cooking of bacon rather than to expound on its character, I won't go into the different types of bacon (back bacon, jowl bacon, cottage bacon, middle bacon, streaky bacon), or the different curing processes (dry cured, wet cured, sugar cured, applewood smoked, hickory smoked, unsmoked). Let's just assume we're dealing with ordinary strips, slices, or rashers of good old grocery store bacon.

Well, let me stop myself there for a minute: the best way to cook bacon is to start with a quality product. Generally speaking, that means looking beyond the meat counter at the grocery store. That's not to say you can't find good bacon at the supermarket. In the U.S., Oscar Mayer is probably the top of the line national brand, but Hormel makes some good stuff and there are lots and lots of other fine quality national and regional brands to choose from. Local and store brands are an "iffy" proposition. Publix has an excellent private label bacon, but I have not found many other store brands that compare favorably to the more expensive name brands. And none of the local, regional, or national brands compare with the exceptional product being produced by artisans like Tennessee's Allen Benton. Benton's Bacon, procured only online or at the Benton's SmokyMountain Country Hams smokehouse in Madisonville, Tennessee, will change your life. There's a reason Michelin starred chefs from coast to coast swear by the stuff. Iowa's Vande Rose Farms also produces a superior bacon as do the folks at Neuske's in Wisconsin. Unfortunately, these products – when and where you can find them – are gonna cost you more than the common brands. You can't buy quality bacon for a dollar a pound.

Case in point: I have a relative who is absolutely, positively convinced that store brands and economy brands are every bit as good as name brands. I can't convince him that saving pennies on the cheapest stuff he can buy sometimes winds up costing more in the long run. So when I went shopping with him, I bought a pound of Hormel Black Label bacon and he bought his usual cut rate store brand. I cooked up batches of both and laid them out side by side on a plate. My bacon had minimal shrinkage. Each piece cooked up to a length of between five and six inches. It retained a nice even strip of lean meat throughout. It cooked evenly and had a wonderful, rich, smoky flavor. His bacon shrank down to uneven little pieces of curled up fat barely three inches in length with practically no lean meat on them. And it was absolutely flavorless. But, by golly, it was sixty-five cents cheaper than my Hormel! You get what you pay for.

Okay, back to the kitchen. You've chosen your bacon, now choose your cooking medium. I learned to cook bacon on a steel flat top grill plate, and I've used everything from electric griddles to toaster ovens to broilers to non-stick cookware. And, of course, there is always the microwave. But for my money, nothing works better than frying up your bacon on the stovetop. And for that, nothing beats cast iron. A well-seasoned cast iron skillet or griddle and bacon are just made for each other.

Begin by taking your bacon out of the refrigerator ten or fifteen minutes before you intend to use it. The slices will separate a little easier. If you must use fresh from the fridge cold bacon, a rubber spatula or the dull side of a butter knife slid along the length of the slices with a slight rocking motion should help separate them neatly.

Start with a cold pan. This will help reduce the amount of splattering. Splattering occurs in part because of the quick salt-brining wet-cure method used by most of today's meat processors. The liquid soaks into the meat, and when water hits hot oil – well, you know what happens. Starting cold and cooking low and slow will keep the snapping, crackling, and popping to a minimum.

Low and slow is always the way to go. Never exceed medium-low to medium heat. Bacon can go from barely cooked to barely edible in about two seconds if you're not careful. Watch it carefully and turn it frequently. Now, some people use tongs or a fork to turn bacon. I use a standard kitchen turner. Some people call it a pancake turner, others just call it a spatula. Whatever you call it, here's why I use it instead of a fork or tongs; not only can I turn the bacon over cleanly and easily, I can also press it down. Pressing the bacon while cooking it keeps the slices from curling up and produces nice flat, evenly cooked slices. They sell bacon presses to do the job, some of them cutely shaped like pigs, but I just press down with my turner to get the same effect.

From the “did you know” department; did you know that older bacon cooks – and burns – quicker than fresh bacon? So watch the stuff from the package you opened last week. And, obviously, thick sliced bacon cooks more slowly than thin.

Don't overcrowd your pan. Cooking in small batches might take longer, but it will yield better quality results. Some people cut the slices in half. Meh. Leave 'em long. They're gonna shrink anyway. If you're going to make several batches, drain off the excess grease in the pan after each batch. Or after every other batch at most. Otherwise, you're basically shallow-frying the bacon in its own grease and it won't come out as nice and crispy that way.

As with most cooking techniques, practice makes perfect. Only you know how soft or crisp you like your bacon. It's a real challenge when I make breakfast for a particular couple of friends. He likes his bacon really soft, barely cooked. She likes it crisped, but not overdone, which is the way I prefer it, too. My wife, however, likes hers cooked really crisp, almost to the point of burning. I usually manage to please everyone. It's all a matter of watching and timing.

Finally, remove the bacon from the pan and lay it out on a double layer of paper towels. Allow the towels to absorb the grease and blot it off the top of the slices, as well. If the cooked bacon is going to have to sit for awhile while you cook eggs, make toast, or whatever, you might try setting your oven on "warm" and sticking the bacon in there on a plate to keep it nice and warm for serving.

Another increasingly popular method involves the oven for actually cooking the bacon rather than just keeping it warm. I've done it this way and I am not a real fan of the method. It's commonly done in high-volume restaurant kitchens and it is cleaner and more convenient if you're cooking a lot of bacon. But there's something about the texture. I can always tell pan fried bacon from oven baked.

If you really must cook your bacon in the oven, set your rack in the middle portion of the oven and preheat the oven to 400°. Lay your bacon out on a rimmed baking pan lined with parchment paper or aluminum foil. Better yet, a slotted broiler pan, if you have one. If not, a wire rack placed in the baking pan works, too. Using the rack or the slotted pan allows the grease to drip away as the bacon cooks rather than having the bacon poach in its grease. The bacon will be crisper when cooked on the rack and softer directly on the pan. Your preference. Once the oven once reaches temperature, place the pan on the center rack and cook the bacon for 15 to 20 minutes. Keep an eye on it. If too much fat starts to accumulate, take the pan out and drain it off. When it's done, remove the bacon and drain it on paper towels.

The advantages to this method are many: you can cook a lot of bacon at once – a whole pound, if you want; the bacon will cook absolutely flat with no curling; you don't have to turn it or tend it; there's more space on the stovetop for other things; and cleanup is a breeze. All that said, it's still my second favorite method. Call me stubborn and old-fashioned.

My least favorite way to cook bacon is the microwave. Yeah, it cooks in a jiffy, but the results are.....unpalatable at best. The only time I cook bacon in the microwave is if I'm going to crumble it for “bacon bits” in a salad or on a baked potato. The microwave excels at making bacon dry and crunchy.

If you really, really must use the microwave, you can either employ one of those nifty, grooved microwave bacon cookers you see on TV or you can just use a microwave safe plate. Either way, lay the bacon out so its not touching. Otherwise it will fuse into a large, crispy mass and be very difficult to separate. Cover the bacon with a paper towel, unless you're really into cleaning the microwave. Just lay the towel over the bacon gently. Don't press it down or you'll have loads of fun trying to remove the little bits of paper towel that will invariably cook into your bacon. Rule of thumb; one minute cooking time per slice. But, as all the microwave instructions disclaim, microwave temperatures do vary according to the power of the oven, so watch it carefully. If it looks like it needs a little more cook time, do so in 30 second intervals. You'd be surprised how much difference there is between 30 and 45 seconds. I've had bacon go from soggy to rigor mortis in that little interval. Watch it. No need to drain, but get the cooked bacon off the paper towels as quickly as possible. The bacon is likely still cooking for a few seconds after you take it out of the microwave and it will cook itself right onto your paper towels if you don't remove it quickly. And be careful; that plate and those greasy paper towels are going to be hot.

There you have it: fry your bacon for best results, bake it if you're cooking a lot and want easy cleanup, and microwave it only when you're desperate.

James Beard said it: “There are few sights that appeal to me more than the streaks of lean and fat in a good side of bacon, or the lovely round of pinkish meat framed in delicate white fat that is Canadian bacon. Nothing is quite as intoxicating as the smell of bacon frying in the morning, save perhaps the smell of coffee brewing.” But that's another subject entirely.

Food Gifts For The Holidays (And Any Other Time)

Order Great Food From These Places Any Time Of Year

The holidays are here and it's time for (trumpet fanfare) my first annual holiday food gift guide. To be honest, I'll probably list the same places for my second, third, and any subsequent holiday food gift guides, just because they're that good. And don't be stuck on the “holiday” aspect. You can order great food from these places any time of year, whether for gifts or just as a treat for yourself.

Bear in mind, these are not places I picked at random through an online search: these are quality producers I have actually visited and frequented and whose products I use myself. Most are artisans who carefully handcraft their goods. A couple are commercial manufacturers, but they produce a quality product that I appreciate and am happy to recommend.

Let's begin with chocolate.

Nestled up in the peaks of the Blue Ridge mountains near Asheville is the little town of Black Mountain, North Carolina. It's a great little vacation spot and a mecca for antique shoppers. It's also where Black Mountain Chocolate got its start. Their logo says “Crafted From The Bean,” and that's what makes Black Mountain Chocolate's chocolate so good. Black Mountain Chocolate is an Ecole Chocolat Certified Chocolate Maker. They start with fresh cocoa beans, which they roast, crack, winnow, and grind right there in their factory. Then they further hand craft all that chocolate goodness into a variety of finished products that include incredible small batch chocolate bars, chocolate treats like cocoa nib granola and chocolate pecan butter, and a unique drinking chocolate that is unlike any you've had before.

You can order online or you can visit the factory and kitchen and buy direct at the source. But don't plan a trip to Black Mountain just yet because they moved the whole shebang to Winston-Salem, North Carolina awhile back. The new digs are in the heart of the artsy district of downtown Winston-Salem at 732 N. Trade Street. You can call them at 336-293-4698. You can also follow them on Facebook or log on to http://www.blackmountainchocolate.com. I promise, once you've had Black Mountain Chocolate, you'll never eat another Hershey bar.

A day without bacon is like a day without joy. And no place on earth is more joyful than Madisonville, Tennessee, home to Benton's Smoky Mountain Country Hams.

Allen Benton produces pork products par excellence. His eponymous country hams are, indeed, legendary, and he makes a prosciutto worthy of any Italian artisan. But it's Benton's bacon that makes the world beat a path to his door – literally. Allen's place is located on the outskirts of Madisonville, a hamlet just a little ways south of Knoxville and a stone's throw away from the Great Smoky Mountains. And I've never been in the place that I haven't found Allen chatting with somebody from California or Florida or Texas or New York. Or China. Or Australia. Seriously. There isn't a chef worth his Michelin star that doesn't drool over Benton's bacon and Allen's client list reads like a James Beard “Who's Who.” Besh, Brock, Chang, Colicchio, Keller – a veritable roll call of top chefs.

So, if the stuff's so great, why can't you run down to your local Kroger and buy a pound? Oh, it's not for a lack of effort on the part of national grocery chains. Several of them have approached Allen about distributing his product. But Allen makes bacon the way his grandparents made it back in Scott County, Virginia and if he were to sell out to Kroger, et.al., he'd have to change the way he makes his bacon, and he ain't about to do it. And, frankly, with dozens of world-renowned chefs buying the stuff in hundred-pound increments, he doesn't have to.

You can follow the path to Allen Benton's door at 2603 Highway 411 N. in Madisonville, Tennessee. Or you can call him at 423-442-5003. Or just go online at http://bentonscountryhams2.com and order the pinnacle of pork products for yourself.

Not too far up the road from Allen Benton's Madisonville smokehouse is the the town of Philadelphia, Tennessee. There's not a lot happening in Philadelphia, located just off I-75 on the way to or from Knoxville. It's kind of a quiet place. I mean, how much noise can 533 people make? But cows? Now that's a different story. The cows out on West Lee Highway at Sweetwater Valley Farm make a lot of noise – and some the best cheese you'll ever eat.

The billboards along I-75 read, “Cheese. Cows. Wows!” And I heartily agree with the “wows” part. Well....I agree about the cheese and the cows, too, but “wow” is all you can say once you've been there. Sweetwater Valley Farm produces award-winning cheeses, which, although produced in a modern, state-of-the-art facility, preserve the fine art and craft of making cheese in a traditional, old-fashioned farmstead manner. The folks at Sweetwater Valley Farm control the entire process from cow to consumer in order to create the highest quality cheddar cheese available on the market today. Colby, mild cheddar, sharp cheddar, smoked cheddar, and a variety of flavored cheddars like salsa cheddar, tomato-herb cheddar, and roasted garlic pepper cheddar are just the beginning.

Like Benton's bacon, you can't buy Sweetwater Valley Farm cheese in the grocery store. And probably for the same reasons. But you can stop by the farm at 17988 W. Lee Highway in Philadelphia, you can call them at 865-458-9192 or toll free at 877-862-4332, or you can check them out online at http://www.sweetwatervalley.com. Any way you slice it, Sweetwater Valley Farm's cheese will make you say “wow!”

While we're on the subject of cheese, let's scoot on over to North Carolina where Ashe County Cheese is among the most popular tourist attractions in the state. Originally started by Kraft in the 1930s as part of the company's efforts to consolidate several small cheese plants in the area, the facility has undergone many changes over the years. It is currently under the ownership of an award-winning Wisconsin Master Cheesemaker, producing everything from old style cheddar daisy wheels to a wide variety of cheeses and butter, including its original Sienna cheese, its many flavored cheeses, and its newest variety, Juusto cheese – a mild Scandinavian cheese. Cheese curds are a Wisconsin staple and Ashe County Cheese has 'em. They also have a delicious Mountain Gouda and a couple of varieties of hard to find hoop cheese, a traditional cheese made only from milk.

Ashe County cheese products are available at several specialty shops and farmers markets in North Carolina. The best place to go, though, is right to the source. They have a huge showroom in West Jefferson, North Carolina and they make cheese several days a week, so don't be surprised to find a tour bus parked out front at 106 E. Main Street. Of course, if West Jefferson is not exactly on your way home, you can call them at 336-246-2501 or visit online at http://www.ashecountycheese.com.

And what's cheese without bread? La Farm Bakery in Cary, North Carolina is an amazing place. It's a little bit of France transplanted to a growing community in The Triangle area that also includes Raleigh, Durham, and Chapel Hill. French-trained Maitre Boulanger (Master Baker) and James Beard Award semifinalist Lionel Vatinet produces bread that will change your perception of bread, especially if all you've ever had for reference is awful store-bought stuff. I've baked all my own breads for many years, and Lionel's stunningly beautiful and delicious loaves of pure ambrosia simply make me weep. Rustic Italian, Pain de Mie, Ciabatta, and Challah are just a few of the fantastic breads you'll discover. And that doesn't even begin to scratch the surface of all the wonderful cakes, cookies, tarts, and other delectable baked goods made fresh every day.

Unfortunately, all these goodies are fresh, wholesome, and natural, made with only the finest ingredients, most locally sourced, and are completely preservative free. That means if you live in California, say, and want a loaf boxed up and sent to your door......it probably ain't gonna happen. Most of La Farm's awesome products are only available in store. They also sell to a variety of Raleigh-area Whole Foods stores and farmers markets. BUT.....don't despair: La Farm does offer a limited selection of breads in a sampler that is available for delivery. They also have a signature gift basket and a variety of mixes and other products available for shipment as gifts. (Of course, if you order them and don't give them to anybody, who's to know?)

When I'm in the area, I will literally go a hundred miles out of my way to stop in Cary and stock up at La Farm. It doesn't hurt that they also have a great little cafe on premises that serves fabulous fare made from the fruits of their labors. It's all located in the Preston Corners Shopping Center at 4248 NW Cary Parkway in Cary. Call them at 919-657-0657 or check them out at https://www.lafarmbakery.com.

“Sweet In Every Sense Since 1947,” Kilwins Chocolate Kitchen is known for its rich and creamy ice cream. And if you've never had it, there aren't enough “o”s in “good” to really describe it. But there's so much more to Kilwins – fortunate since ordering ice cream by mail is an “iffy” proposition. Headquartered in Michigan, there are Kilwins stores all over the place; there's probably one near you. I've got two of them within an hour's drive. But just in case, they also do a brisk mail order business, bringing some of the best chocolates, fudges, caramel corn, brittles, and toffees you've ever put in your mouth right to your door. There are shipping restrictions on some of their more perishable products, so maybe a Kilwins gift card might be a good idea. As I said, there are stores all over the place. A bunch of them are in “touristy”places like the aforementioned Black Mountain, North Carolina, Blowing Rock, North Carolina, Gatlinburg, Tennessee, Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, Branson, Missouri, Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, and on just about every street corner in Florida. But there are a lot of them in “regular” locations, too. Besides the ice cream, I'm a big fan of the caramel corn, but there's not a single thing in the inventory that I wouldn't gladly make that hour's drive to get. Really. Check 'em out at https://www.kilwins.com.

While we're on the topic of snacks, I would be terribly remiss if I failed to mention a couple of my all-time favorite snack sources. I never met a potato chip I didn't like, but I really love Utz Potato Chips. Utz chips are at home in Hanover, Pennsylvania but they are found in homes all along the Eastern Seaboard from Maine to Georgia. And beyond, thanks to a burgeoning mail order business.

I like Utz chips for the full potato flavor and light texture, but the thing I most appreciate is the comparative lack of sodium. At 95 mg, Utz chips have about half the sodium of almost every other chip on the market. (There's 170 mg in Lays.) In fact, after years of enjoying the natural potato taste of Utz, I find other chips way too salty.

Of course, Utz is more than just potato chips. They have a full line of snack products – pretzels, cheese balls, potato sticks, and much more. My wife is particularly partial to their popcorn. Last time we were in Hanover, we stopped at the Utz Factory Store and stocked up on our favorites. But you don't have to make a pilgrimage to Pennsylvania to enjoy Utz in your home. Just head to http://utzsnacks.com and order to your heart's content. But if you do happen to be in Hanover – say you've just visited nearby Hershey or Gettysburg – pop in to 861 Carlisle Street and prepare to be delighted.

One more, and it's mostly a nostalgia entry. As a kid growing up just north of Chicago, my love of potato chips was nurtured by Jays. As the slogan says, “Can't Stop Eating 'Em.” And that's been true for more than 80 years. In those pre-Internet ordering days, Jay's chips were only available in or near the Chicago area, so I lost touch with my first love when I moved out of Chicagoland around age 10. I'd stock up from time to time on visits back home, but, alas, they were a fleeting pleasure. Until the World Wide Web made all things possible. And that includes having Jays signature Jays Potato Chips, Jays Ridges Potato Chips, Jays Waves Potato Chips, Jays Kettle Cooked Potato Chips, and a full line of other snacks like shoestring potato sticks (my other favorite), pork rinds, corn chips and cheese puffs delivered right to my door. And again, my wife is addicted to their popcorn, marketed under the O-KE-DOKE label.

Sadly, the Jays products that I knew and loved as a child, the ones made by the Japp family at a manufacturing plant in the Windy City, are gone now, absorbed into a larger snack conglomerate and distributed as a subsidiary of Snyder's of Hanover. On the bright side, I stumbled upon some Jays chips recently and found that, even though that nostalgic “hometown” element is gone, the folks at Snyders – coincidentally also based in Hanover, Pennsylvania – have done a fine job of retaining the character of the product so it remains largely as it was when I experienced my first blush of crispy potato infatuation. Happily, even today I “Can't Stop Eating 'Em,” and I would encourage you to eat some, too. Find Jays products online at http://www.snyderslance.com/branddetails/brandjays.

Happy Holidays! And if you happen to be reading this in June, remember it's never too early to plan for the future.

Bacon, Apple, and Sage Turkey: A Holiday Hit

It's All About The Barding

Holiday time is once again upon us and flocks of “perfect turkey” tips are waddling around everywhere. (Turkeys don't fly, you know; ask the folks at WKRP in Cincinnati.)

I hit upon this simple recipe for moist, tasty turkey many years ago. We've adapted it slightly and it is now our “go to” preparation for Thanksgiving, Christmas, or any time we want to serve a really perfect turkey. We usually cook three or four turkeys every holiday season and we've never had a bad one yet. It's all about the barding.

I know what comes to most minds when the word “bard” is used, but the culinary application has nothing to do with Shakespeare. Not that The Bard didn't have a few things to say about culinary matters that could be appropriate for the holidays: “He hath eaten me out of house and home; he hath put all my substance into that fat belly of his.” – Henry IV Part I: act 2, scene 1. Or perhaps, “Eight wild boars roasted whole at breakfast, and but twelve persons there; is this true?.” – Antony and Cleopatra: act 2, scene 1

Barding involves preparing a cut of meat for roasting by covering it with strips of fat. The fat of choice is almost always some form of bacon. You can bard almost anything. Even the cheapest cuts of meat will benefit from the application of bacon, and the more expensive cuts – bacon-wrapped filet mignon, for instance – will be that much more delectable. But barding works particularly well on poultry. It's basically a deliciously foolproof self-basting method. We'll get to the details in a minute.

First, gather your ingredients:

1 medium onion, cut into 8 wedges, divided

2 apples (any sweet variety), cut into wedges
1 tablespoon dried sage
1 teaspoon dried thyme
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper

8 tbsp (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
1 (12-lb.) turkey
1 (12 oz) package bacon
1 (6 oz) can apple juice concentrate, thawed

A quick note about the bacon: this is not the time or the place for expensive cuts of lean, meaty, artisan bacon. Nope. You want the cheapest, fattiest store-brand bacon you can find.

Equipment-wise, you'll need a roasting pan with a rack, and a thermometer. I highly – I'll emphasize that again – HIGHLY recommend a probe thermometer. Buy it for the big bird and you'll find yourself using it for lots of other things, too. The probe part of the thermometer gets stuck in the bird. A cable runs from the probe to a monitor that you place outside your oven. Set the monitor to 165° F and just walk away. When the thing beeps, the bird's done. No hassle and no guesswork. Yes, you can use an instant-read thermometer, but it's a pain, what with having to open and close the oven door – which affects the temperature and hence the cooking time – and makes little holes all over your bird unless you manage to hit exactly the same spot every time you check the temp. An old-fashioned meat thermometer works, too. But I'll swear by the probe variety any day. Please,whatever else you do, don't rely on those stupid little plastic “pop-up” thingys that they package with some turkeys. They are absolutely useless and are the cause of more dry, overcooked birds than almost anything else. Optionally, you may also want some butcher's twine, a bulb baster, and some turkey lifters.

Now, here's what you're going to do:

Make sure your turkey is thoroughly thawed and patted dry with paper towels. Don't forget to remove the plastic bag with the giblets. Unpleasant things happen if you forget.

Preheat your oven to 325°F. Scatter half of the onion around the bottom of the roasting pan and put the rack in place. Place the turkey on the rack. Some people advocate placing the bird “upside down” (breast side down) on the rack, as this allows the juices to flow into the breast meat as the bird cooks. And that's okay. For this recipe, though, the old “right side up” placement works best.

Make a compound butter by combining the sage, the thyme, and some salt and pepper in a small bowl. Mix the herbs and spices thoroughly with the softened butter, then gently lift the skin of the turkey and apply the butter mixture directly and liberally to the breast, taking care not to tear the skin as your work. You might want to remove extraneous rings and things. Save about a tablespoon of the butter for later. (You're doing this because it will add flavor, help retain moisture, and aid in achieving a nice, crispy skin.)

Rub the reserved butter around the inside of the cavity, then place the remaining onion in the cavity, along with the wedges of apple. (You're doing this for flavor and moisture. Apples and onions are very juicy and as they cook, they will release their moisture and flavor into the interior of the bird.)

If you're going to truss your turkey, here's how you do it: Place the turkey breast side up. Cross the legs and loop a piece of butcher's twine over, around and under the crossed legs several times, tying it off securely. Tuck the first joint of each wing under the body of the bird. Now you've got a nice compact package that will cook evenly and be easier to carve. This is where most people stop. And that's fine. Some people go a step farther and lace up the cavity. Meh. If you want to go to the trouble, you'll need to do it first. And you'll need trussing pins or needles. Then you start by passing the pins through the skin on both sides of the cavity. Beginning at the top pin, lace a piece of twine back and forth as you would shoelaces. Pull it snug and tie it securely at the bottom. Pull the neck skin over and fasten it underneath with trussing pins or toothpicks. Now you can truss the legs and tuck the wings under as previously directed. Me, I just truss and tuck. The lacing is usually reserved for stuffed birds (keeps the stuffing inside) and we're not going to get into a discussion here of the health hazards presented by actually stuffing a bird with stuffing.

Arrange slices of bacon over the breast and legs. (Again, moisture, flavor, and crispiness.) Some people do elaborate basket weave patterns and such. Some even tie the bacon blanket in place with twine. Again, meh. Just make sure the bird is covered. Then loosely tent the breast with foil.

If you're using the probe thermometer that I highly recommend, now's the time to place the probe. Proper placement is essential. Insert the thermometer about 2 1/2 inches into the thickest portion of the turkey breast or into the inner thigh near the breast. Make sure the thermometer does not touch a bone. This applies whether or not you're using a probe thermometer; same rules go for instant-reads or plain old meat thermometers. (Another quick tip: when inserting a regular thermometer into the turkey breast, insert it from the side. The thermometer is easier to read and more accurate than when you put it in from the top.)

Okay, into the oven! Bake for about an hour, then remove the foil and the bacon. I usually discard the bacon. Some people break it up and serve it like cracklings. Your choice. Some people also leave the bacon in place for the entire cooking time. Again, your choice. But if you choose to do that, you'll sacrifice your golden brown skin because the bacon will insulate it and keep it from browning.

Assuming you have removed the bacon, continue to bake the turkey for 30 to 40 minutes; then baste with the pan juices. Bake an additional 30 to 40 minutes and baste again. Now, pour the apple juice concentrate over the turkey and bake for another 30 to 40 minutes.

A word about basting: it's not entirely necessary, especially with the compound butter and the bacon providing lots of fat and moisture. Most people do it because Mom did it and Grandma did it and Great-Grandma did it, etc. Because poultry skin is fairly impermeable, you're not doing much for the moisture content of the meat. From that aspect, basting is like pouring water on a raincoat. Most of what you achieve through basting is extra flavor and extra crispness. The only place you really need to baste with this recipe is when you add the apple juice concentrate near the end of the process. And besides, all that opening and closing of the oven door makes it harder to maintain even heat in the oven, thus prolonging your cooking time.

Your turkey is done when the temperature reaches 165°F measured in the breast or 175°F measured in the thickest part of the thigh.

Using lifters or tongs, tilt the turkey to drain any juices from the cavity into the roasting pan. Remove the turkey to a carving board, cover it loosely with foil, and allow it to rest at least 20 minutes before carving. DON'T SKIP THIS STEP.......unless you like dry turkey. Trust us, the bird will remain nice and hot until you're ready to serve.

(Note: if you plan to make gravy from the pan drippings, be aware that the smoky flavors of the bacon and the sweetness of the apples and apple juice concentrate may affect the character of your gravy. You may like a smoky, sweet gravy. If not, prepare a more traditional gravy using butter, flour, and chicken broth.)

Buon appetito! And Happy Holidays!