Bacon?

Should have said: my favourite is the waitrose essential smoked-streaky.

good value, perfect thickness for me and never noticed any water loss.

For me, the above bacon would be underdone. I'd still eat it obviously, but I prefer it when most of the collagen/fat has been cooked out, so the fatty bits aren't like jelly any more.
 
Can do. It's not very good.

It loses heat too quickly, it's full of sodium and fat and nitrates, most of it is chock full of water and disappears upon cooking... I still buy it from time to time from my local quality butcher, and I use lardons in cooking, but I don't understand the mass hysteria or the tagline 'everything is better with bacon' when it's a pretty ****-poor meat.
 
Gilly said:
Can do. It's not very good.

It loses heat too quickly, it's full of sodium and fat and nitrates, most of it is chock full of water and disappears upon cooking... I still buy it from time to time from my local quality butcher, and I use lardons in cooking, but I don't understand the mass hysteria or the tagline 'everything is better with bacon' when it's a pretty ****-poor meat.
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Proper dry cured bacon has less of the salt and water issue but I take your general point.

The reasons I'd say that bacon has mass market appeal is: cheap, strong-flavoured, quick to cook, long shelf life. Those might not all be reasons for you to like it personally but I can see why it is so popular given all those factors.
 
Update 1!

Tesco smoked back bacon.

This is the 'standard' bacon from Tesco. 10 in a pack and not expensive in comparison. I've steered away from anything cheaper, and I suspect in the past I've been a cheapskate and bought bad bacon.

There was far more white gunk, and more water with this bacon. I had to use several paper towels during cooking to remove the water from it. I used no oil when cooking this bacon. My frying pan doesn't need it to be non-stick - I can fry eggs without oil.

As for how it tasted? Well, surprisingly it was good, not as good as the Wiltshire cure, but none the less it was tasty bacon. Not too salty either which I had feared.

I cooked all 10 slices of this with nothing else to report other than the pictures of the mess in the pan.

It's fairly tolerable to just use a sheet of kitchen roll to dry the pan midway through cooking, although not ideal. The question I guess is if I'm actually saving money because of the weight of water that's lost or not.

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Next up is Tesco's butcher's choice bacon.

This is a bit more expensive than the other stuff - less rashers in each pack. Not as expensive as the Wiltshire/Dry cures.

I cooked this up in two batches, 4 rashers in each. For both I made a nice BLT sandwich.

The first batch I used no oil, the second batch I did use oil to see what difference it makes. As I've said I don't need it for the pan to be non-stick, however I'm aware it may help heat conduct better so it may affect things.

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It's clear to say that there was far less water than the bacon before. There was a fair amount in the pan but it was gone by the time it was cooked. The sandwich tasted ok, but the bacon tasted about the worst so far, surprisingly.

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So another batch was done today, and this time I used oil. This time the bacon was very salty, and my lips have been irritated by it. It still didn't taste as good as either of the two previous packs of bacon and I will not be buying this kind again. It would seem that by removing the excess water I remove the excess salt, but with this stuff there's no excess water by the time they're cooked - that's my guess anyway. Far too salty!

Next up is the streaky bacon which is going to get cooked between two oven trays, baked, and also on the grill rack grilled, and maybe baked. If there's bacon left I'll do it in the microwave just for comparison's sake.
 
craarc said:
it looked liked normal bacon strips etc but was made from beef weird i know but it was bacon made from beef
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I've read recipes online for lamb bacon which I imagine might be more suitable given the fat content.

How did the beef bacon compare to pork bacon?
 
well at the time it was all we could get and it was a fair few years ago bud but we bought it and used it so it couldnt of been that bad.

im talking 1970`s here now so i guess things have moved on
 
5 rashes of bacon in a frying pan?! No wonder you are getting water. Not enough room at all, and as soon as you have so much in there you'll drastically bring down the temperature and stew the bacon.

3 rashers, max! I'm enjoying your travels through the bacon world though, and I read elsewhere that you're a new cook but it's good to see that you're trying!
 
A decent butcher should be able to advise you on how much water is in their bacon and they'll sell it with the rind on. On a side note; they should also tell you how long they hang their meat for and where it comes from.

The best meat I have found in a supermarket has been Waitrose and that is on their cut price deals on a sunday.

If using supermarket stuff fry with no oil until the water is out and discard it before adding some oil and frying.

With decent bacon and rind you can trim off the rind in strips and start cooking in oil before the bacon so they crisp up into little shrivly things. They flavour the oil and help to cook the rest of the bacon.
 
Ahleckz said:
5 rashes of bacon in a frying pan?! No wonder you are getting water. Not enough room at all, and as soon as you have so much in there you'll drastically bring down the temperature and stew the bacon.

3 rashers, max! I'm enjoying your travels through the bacon world though, and I read elsewhere that you're a new cook but it's good to see that you're trying!
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It's a massive pan - I wish I'd got a smaller one. Although normally I wouldn't cooking 5 strips at a time.

Yeah, I've decided to eat a bit better now (bacon excluded) so I'm getting a box of veg and fruit delivered every week, and I'm going to eat every single bit of it, meaning I'll have to do lots of cooking.
 
jms198 said:
A decent butcher should be able to advise you on how much water is in their bacon and they'll sell it with the rind on. On a side note; they should also tell you how long they hang their meat for and where it comes from.

The best meat I have found in a supermarket has been Waitrose and that is on their cut price deals on a sunday.
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I'm in Scotland so Waitrose is out...

As far as a decent butcher, as I've said there's none nearby. Additionally the Tesco bacon which filled the pan with water said it was 97% bacon, and less than 3% water.. so I don't know if it's added water that's the problem.

In any case though, I think I've ruled out normal bacon and it's dry cure/wiltshire cure from now on. The streaky bacon might be ok in the oven though... I'll update the thread when I've tried that.
 
The Halk said:
Next up is Tesco's butcher's choice bacon.

The sandwich tasted ok, but the bacon tasted about the worst so far, surprisingly.
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I was really unimpressed with Tesco's offering. Sainsburys own brand food isn't usually very good, but their equivalent bacon at this price point is much better.
 
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