Not too long ago the average housewife would have been amazed at how wasteful we are, throwing out all that great bacon fat. After all it’s a rendered fat, just like lard or tallow, suitable for cooking and use in recipes.
I followed the lead of someone who’s done more research and started keeping mine. It’s really easy to keep, and much better than vegetable oil for frying.
All you need is a bowl and a paper towel next time you make bacon.
Pour the fat into the bowl while it’s still hot.
Lift the paper towel up by the corners and let the melted fat drain through. The hotter it is when you do this step, the faster it will drain.
The paper towel will catch all the solid bits, which is all we’re really trying for.
The finished product will be anywhere from light yellow to nearly brown, depending on how crispy you made the bacon and how hot you had the pan.
I leave this to cool for a while before transferring to a plastic container, which I then keep in the fridge.
I could go with glass or stoneware for storage, but I’d worry about shattering it by pouring hot fat into a cold vessel. You can see in the photo above that I’ve got three or four rounds of bacon fat in there. We like bacon more than we like frying, so we end up with a surplus. If you know some recipes that call for bacon fat, let me know.
In colder areas you can probably store this in the pantry, though you’d have to have a secure lid and make sure the outside is spotlessly clean or you’ll attract pests. In fact, just put it in the fridge. If you want it softer for a recipe take it out an hour or so ahead of time.
Unlike lard, this will add some flavor to whatever you’re cooking. But everything’s better with bacon.
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OK, I know that this post is almost 10 months old but this is the first time I have seen it because I didn’t stumble across and subscribe to the blog until a few months ago. I use bacon fat to add flavor to my homemade from scratch refried beans. I will also use it sometimes if I don’t have bacon to add the flavor to fried eggs. Mostly use it for the refried beans though.
All my eggs taste like bacon. My pancakes usually do, too. And when I do refried beans sometime this fall, those are going to taste like bacon.
So yeah, i love this and do it but I get paranoid about “how long can it be safe” even if refridgerated. is there a timeline? i know back in the day they kept a can by the stove and just replenished – but they did quite a few things that make me shudder as well!
If you really worried about it put it in the freezer it freezes fine and will basically last forever
If you look at the latest Danish cookbook excerpt, you’ll see that they used fat to preserve meat … indefinitely.
I am wondering how long I can keep the bacon fat? Uses for bacon: crumbled up in hard boiled devil eggs; use the bacon grease and saute onions as a base for chili.
Well, if the old Danish cookbook I’ve got is to be believed, lard used to be used to preserve meats “indefinitely”. And I can tell you from personal experience that the bacon fat I’ve kept in the fridge has lasted over a year without going rancid. I kept topping off the same container until about a month ago, when I decided it was time to switch it out. I’ve got enough left in the original to do one more meal.
Just came across this one. Trying to catch up on all I’ve missed since joining so late. I have always stored bacon grease because my mother, her mother and generations past, have always saved this delicious by-product of bacon! Yum! Mom had a “tin” that she kept by the stove… no refrigeration… but she also used it everyday… added to the pot of green beans from the garden (and the canning jar); fried potatoes; always the eggs; wilted greens salad; ahh the memories. I’ll send you the wilted greens recipe.
B, did you see the wilted spinach recipe I did? Same idea. I like the looks of yours, too. The dressing looks ind of like a ceaser.
Question: when I followed your directions here (which worked exceptionally well), my stored fat was almost as white as the driven snow whereas “Your [fat's] sort of a brownish colour…”
(a) What’s the discrepancy?
(b) What’s the quote?
If you have the time, you should read this (and part II). What do you think? What’re your preferred ways to cook bacon? You’ve talked about bacon a lot (fat, bits, etc.), but have you ever gone into your preferred ways of cooking it and your tips and tricks?
Thor, my best guess on the color is I cooked it longer than you did. I’m a pan frying fan myself. But there’s another way those two articles didn’t mention.
It got a bit long for a comment, so I put it on the forum.
Oh, and I’ve got no idea on the quote.
I use leftover bacon fat instead of Crisco when I make southern style biscuits.
Pete, it doesn’t give the biscuits a bacon flavor? Not that it will matter much once you pour on the sausage gravy, I suppose.
I am from the north so the whole ’saving bacon fat’ was new to me. That is until i married. My husbands Gramdma had the best tasting green beans and i could not duplicate that flavor. I tried fat back among several thing but couldnt get it right. I found out she used bacon fat(its supposed to be a secret). I was mortified! But I now save bacon fat, and use it mainly when i cook veggies or eggs etc…
Shannon, all my veggies taste like bacon. Haven’t had any complaints yet.
And we wonder why Americans have the highest obestity rate in the world and the number one cause of death is heart disease?
It is not just from bacon fat. It comes from an entire lifestyle and lack of exercise, proper nutrition, stress and genetics. Did you know that milk fat covers the stomach wall to prevent the absorption of other fats in the stomach? Just one nutritional tidbit to contemplate.
Anon, we didn’t suffer from obesity or heart disease until we tried to cut animal fats out of our diet. If you actually care about nutrition, do some reading at the Weston Price foundation site. I’d recommend starting with The Oiling of America: “Describes the scientific controversy over the association between fat consumption and heart disease.”
If, on the other hand, you just wanted to take a shot at Americans, then … thanks for the feedback.
I always add bacon fat whenever I cook venison. It is such a dry meat and the bacon adds such a good flavor to it.
Linfull, that’s true of a lot of game meat. Lots of recipes say to mix venison 50/50 with ground beef to solve the problem, but I prefer your method. Just add the fat.
Well, in response to Anonymous, I think the real problem with our obesity epidemic is all the processed foods we eat. Think about it, people weren’t as overweight in our parent’s hey days because they had to COOK, not just heat up convenience foods. Everything in moderation, and eat REAL foods.
Laurie, preach it sister!
I use bacon fat when I make cornbread. A generous tablespoon in my iron skillet as it preheats make a nice crispy crust, and it just falls out of the skillet. Oh yeah, it’s really good!
Bacon fat and cornbread are made for each other.
drew,
Just read your comment about using fat to preserve food- check out “achar” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_pickle
which is how MY grandmother cooks =0P
I haven’t tried making any myself; but I’ll let you know if I ever do
me again,
the thing about saving/reusing animal fat for frying is that it was done in a time when you didn’t always eat meat in every meal. So reusing that fat wasn’t about adding flavor so much as it was about not having to pay for butter. It was about frugality more than anything.
Like “soul food” that stuff was made by slaves from the leftovers of the meals they cooked their masters. Those calorie rich cooking techniques were a means of survival. Eating that stuff in small portions while working in the hot sun all day is perfectly fine, but these days most people eat entire plates of it, and then sit in front of a computer all day! That is what leads to things like heart disease.
like, exercise. that’s actually a pretty new concept. people who worked out in fields all day, or chopped down trees for 14 hours a day, they’d never think about running for half an hour after work!
so, yah. if you’re going to use ANY fat, just have smaller portions (which means you get to SAVOR your food!) and get out for a run before starting to cook…
Jehan, you’re so right about being frugal. Lots of ethnic specialties are plants, animals, or specific cuts of animals that most other people don’t eat. They mostly come from a time when that’s the only thing that was left for poorer people to eat. After several generations of eating it, a culture tells itself, “This is a delicacy.”
A friend of mine who has really studied the evolution of ethnic cultures has a great line for it. “You tend to see a lot of new dishes developed toward the end of wars when the only thing left is what didn’t used to be considered food.”
Just have to add…try to find a farmer with pastured animals to buy your meat! Don’t worry about pooring hot grease in the jar, glass won’t shock at that low a temp. Do store everything you can in glass instead of plastic!!!! Check out sites that talk about BPA, PVC and phthalates in plastic!
If you keep your jar out on the stove, I’d agree. But I refrigerate mine. So it’s cold when I add fresh grease to it.
My favorite is bacon mayonnaise.
The only thing I use my mayo for is to make ranch dressing so it’s really bacon ranch dressing.
If you make your own mayo(super easy) just sub liquified but not hot bacon grease for the olive oil or whatever oil you would be putting in your mayo.
I cant seem to keep enough bacon fat in the house. I’m a ranch-on-everything person.
Bacon Fat Mayo. I’ve never made mayo. I will now go make mayo.
I suspect bacon mayo has been the first mayo that lots of people have ever made.
Sharon, I’ve been wanting to do the bacon mayonnaise, but I keep using the bacon grease up too fast. But using it in bacon-ranch dressing … I think that just might take priority next time.
bacon fat makes perfectly delicious grilled cheese sandwiches… or any grilled sandwich for that matter…
Oooh, yeah, that’s lunch tomorrow for sure.
My bacon fat is used for cooking cabbage and chopped onion. What a side dish!!
Presbytera, that sounds simple but good.
Lard can be used to make both (stinky) candels and soap! It was the traditional base for many years. Lye soap is great for people with certain allergies. Simply pour lard through wood ash. Mix in any extra smells you like and put into molds in a cool place for a few days.
Thank you for the post.
Anon, if I ever process a whole pig and have too much lard left over, I might make some soap. But today I have to special order it, and it costs enough that I'm only going to use it for cooking.
MmmmMMM… cornbread, falling right out of my cast iron skillet, just like my grandmother used to make.
I've got Hugenot blood, and apparently my grandmother or one of her ancestors traded recipes with the fork in my family tree which went south to become Cajuns.
Long live bacon fat! Cornbread, fried eggs, mashed potatoes.
The jar I keep in the fridge grosses out my roommate, but I figure the fat was sterile when it went in, and it will damned well be sterile when it hits my Lodge cookware.
People are panning bacon fat for cooking. Anecdotally, I'm 6'4" tall, I eat *anything* I want to eat whenever I want to eat it, I have a sedentary job, and I weigh exactly 200lbs with a 34" waist. My secrets? I stop eating when I'm no longer hungry, I like to walk because it relaxes me, I follow my cravings (I crave a Double Quarter Pounder from McDonalds, I eat it. By the same token, if I crave two pounds of salad, I eat it. If I crave nothing, I eat nothing.) and I avoid margarine like the plague.
Greetings from Ottawa, Canada.
slant6mopar@yahoo.com
Anon, nobody here is panning bacon fat for any reason. We (yes, the royal "we") love bacon.
Hi, thanks for posting how to render the bacon fat. I've found a pie crust that you can use rendered bacon fat in that is said to be moist and tasty. the recipes of youtube from a guy that fixes peoples recipes. heres the recipe: 2 1/2 C flour, 1 TBS Sugar, Pinch of Salt, 1 Cup Cold Butter, 1/4 C Rendered Bacon Fat, 6-8 oz. Cold Water. mix dry ingredients and cut in Butter and Fat then add cold water in whilst folding in crust. Hope you like it. Thanks
I made pancakes the other day from scratch, but instead of adding butter to the batter–as the recipe called for–I added the bacon fat left in the pan. It turned out so delicious, I'm emptying out a jelly jar so I have something to start storing bacon fat in. I'm making everything with bacon fat from here on out.
I've done the pancakes with it once, and I agree. Very yummy.
Before making a pot of jambalaya (in a huge cast iron pot, of course), I cook up a pound of bacon. After I pull out the bacon to break it up, I add cut up chicken, cajun sausage, onion, and peppers to the fat. When the meat is almost done, I add the rice, tomatoes, water (to cook the rice) and seasonings and cook until the rice is done. Then I add the bacon and serve with cornbread and hot sauce. The bacon fat adds a whole world of flavor.
Jerry, that sounds like a fabulous idea. Time to go look up some recipes, see if I can make my own Cajun seasoning.
Those "dregs" that you strain out can be kept in the freezer and used for beans, and vegs and my personal favorite-deviled eggs. More bacon flavor and not so much fat(I tell myself). Sure those bacon bits on the eggs look pretty for guests and parties but for flavor and simplicity save those "dregs" I'm not sure about storage times–mine never last that long.
I can't decide why I like that idea more: The frugality of it, or the never-waste-bacon-ness of it.
Once I found out that saturated fat (please, from traditional, pasture-raised animals) is actually good for you, my frugality demands that I save all that fat from cooking bacon, beef and chicken. They each have their own glass jars in the fridge. Use a lot less olive oil these days.
JayDub, I know schmaltz (chicken fat) is used in a lot of Jewish recipes — matzo ball soup, etc. — but I haven’t heard a lot of uses for beef fat, other than tallow. How do you use it?
Being from the south, we eat lots of bacon. But, we also eat a lot of sausage. What would the consequences be if mixing bacon and sausage grease? And I am talking all kinds of sausage from Jimmy Deans to chorizo to smoked beef sausage. I’m trying to decide if you could use it all mixed up just like plain old bacon grease.
Andrea, the sausage grease will definitely taste like the sausage. That’s not a bad thing, necessarily, but not as versatile as bacon in my opinion. Second is that bacon fat is generally firmer/thicker than sausage grease at the same temperature, so the sausage grease would lower the smoke point. What I mean is it would start smoking at a lower temperature, so you’d have to be much more careful using it to fry with.
My Mother used to do this with the crisco that she used to fry anything, she would reuse it to fry whatever.
Does anyone still do this?
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