How to Cook Perfectly Crisp Bacon in the Oven

(without making a total mess of your kitchen)

If you have ever wanted to learn the secret of how to cook perfectly crisp bacon in the oven every single time, then you are in the right place!!  This guide will help you learn how restaurants and pros are able to get their bacon perfectly crisp without having to deal with a gigantic mess afterwards!

For pretty much my entire life I have cooked bacon in a skillet just like everybody else.  Most of the time the bacon came out just fine because I would always cut a slab of bacon in half so the slices were shorter.  If you cook a full slice of bacon in a skillet, it is difficult to cook the entire slice crisp without burning the middle or leaving the ends soggy. 🤮There is nothing wrong with using a skillet and many fine slices of bacon have been made this way, but using one ALWAYS results in splattered grease all over the kitchen and stove.  Cooking bacon this way was a nuisance, but everyone I knew cooked bacon this way, so you just kind of dealt with it.

Then I got a job in a restaurant to make some extra money during the summers in high school. This is where I learned the correct way to cook bacon perfectly every time…and not have grease from one end of the kitchen to the other.  Below is the technique that I use to guarantee that soggy bacon is a thing of the past.

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Why should you make this recipe:

• It’s bacon…do you really need another reason
• Saturday and Sunday morning breakfasts will be much less chaotic
• Oven cooked bacon is so easy we cook extra on the weekend just to have it for sandwiches during the week
• You can cook as much or as little as you need, feeding a crowd for breakfast is no longer a 3 hour endeavor

Ideas for customizing this recipe:

• Drizzle on some Maple Syrup – just be careful your bacon doesn’t burn
• Lightly sprinkle with red pepper flakes – surprisingly tasty
• Add it to another dish or topping for a salad
• Try different cuts of bacon; thick, thin, center cut, extra thick 😏
  • Now that you have a new technique, you may find a different style of bacon that you like even more…as if.

Things NOT to do when cooking bacon in the oven:

1. Let your bacon sit out and come up to room temp
2. Use aluminum foil, wax paper (this will ruin your oven, bacon, and sheet pan), or cooking spray
3. Preheat your oven first
4. Keep checking on your bacon as it cooks, give it a good 20-25 minutes in the oven and then check it

Tools NECESSARY for Oven Cooked Bacon:

Rarely do I insist that a certain kitchen tool or item is necessary for certain recipes, but the following are absolutely necessary.  If you do not have these two in your house, cooking some sausage links instead, seriously.

• Parchment Paper – not wax paper, aluminum foil, or cooking spray.  PARCHMENT PAPER – cheap works just fine
• A heavy duty cookie sheet – not a thin non-stick cookie sheet, but a proper half sheet tray
• A COLD oven – Do NOT, I repeat, Do NOT preheat your oven before putting in your bacon
  • The cold oven is the secret to preventing splattered grease and well-rendered bacon fat

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How to Cook Perfectly Crisp Bacon

1. Start with a dead cold oven, we’re not going to preheat the oven until AFTER your bacon is in
2. Using a heavy duty rimmed baking sheet, cut a piece of parchment paper to size.
   1. If some parchment hangs over the edges of the pan, this will actually help with cleanup
3. Crumple the parchment into a ball and then flatten out over the sheet pan
   1. Yes, roll the parchment into a ball.  This makes the parchment MUCH easier to work with!!
4. Spread the parchment out to cover your sheet pan
5. Now, lay your bacon out in strips as shown in the picture above
   1. If there are more slices than will fit in this orientation, lay some strips perpendicular along the top
6. AT THIS POINT, you can slide your pan of bacon into your COLD oven
7. Preheat your cold oven with the sheet of bacon to 350°
   1. I always cook my bacon at 350° on the regular setting or 325° if I’m using the convection function
   2. This temp works well for pretty much any type of bacon EXCEPT bacon with sugar; maple syrup, brown sugar, etc.
8. Set a timer for 25 minutes if cooking thin or regular cut bacon, 30 minutes for thick cut
   1. This time INCLUDES the time it takes the oven to preheat; not preheat then set the timer, but set the timer while the oven is preheating
9. This time is never set in stone and over time you will learn how bacon cooks in YOUR oven; thick cut takes between 35 and 40 minutes in MY oven.  The recommended time is just a starting place.
   1. There are variables that can add or remove time depending on several factors; how much bacon you’re cooking, time for your oven to preheat, temperature of your bacon right out of the refrigerator, etc.
10. Check the doneness of your bacon after about 20 minutes and cook longer based on your desired crispiness
    1. After 20 minutes I usually check on it at 5 minute intervals until cooked the way we like it
11. Once your bacon is finished cooking, take it out of the oven and set on some heating pads
12. To drain your bacon, I usually lay down a sheet of Aluminum Foil first and then a layer of paper towels
    1. The Aluminum foil is not necessary here, but I place it underneath the paper towels to keep the drained grease off of my stove.
13. Serve immediately and enjoy!! 🥓

 

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