All the Reasons You Need to Cook Your Bacon in the Oven
It’s always a good time to have a little bacon, but sometimes cooking this tasty meat can feel like a hassle with all the grease and the draining and the worrying about clogging your sink — not to mention accidentally setting off your smoke detector and annoying your neighbors (or is that just me?). All of this is exactly why you should cook your bacon in the oven.
Here’s the easy method of doing so:
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit, and line a cookie sheet with aluminum foil. Lay your bacon on the sheet. Pro tip: If you have a wire rack, place it over the foil-lined cookie sheet, then lay out the bacon. This will help drain off excess grease.
- Cook for 12-15 minutes, depending on how crispy you like your bacon and how hot your oven runs.
- Using tongs, transfer the bacon strips onto paper-towel-lined plates to drain off excess grease.
Here are the benefits of cooking bacon this way:
1. There’s no mess. Since the cooking is done in the oven, you don’t have to deal with hot bacon grease splattering all over your clothes and stovetop. When you’re done, you simply peel up the aluminum foil and discard it.
2. It’s easy to cook a lot of bacon. If you’re hosting brunch at your place, cooking bacon in the oven is a great way to make a lot of bacon all at once. You can do two trays of bacon at a time depending on the size of your oven, which can be up to a pound in one go.
3. It tastes great. This one may seem like a given because when does bacon ever really taste bad?! That said, cooking bacon in the oven results in crispy edges and tender, chewy slices to go with your favorite breakfast dish.
What’s your favorite #bacon recipe? Tag Brit + Co on Instagram.
(Photos via Melanie Burke / Brit + Co)
