Two for Tuesday: Oven Bacon

I hate frying bacon. Nothing about being spit on by popping hot grease is fun. So, I hate frying bacon.

I've tried several different oven bacon recipes, usually with the result of filling my oven and kitchen with smoke, setting off every smoke detector in the entire house, and, a long time later, having either too tough bacon or soggy bacon. There was never a middle ground in bacon texture when I tried baking it.

I tried making bacon in the microwave too. That results in going through a half roll or paper towels, dangerously super-heating my plates, and getting a few pieces of bacon done at a time, with similar texture issues.

But today, oh glorious day, I found method for making

Perfect Oven-Fried Bacon

Here's the key trick:

Do NOT pre-heat your oven.

Once you know that, the rest is super easy.

1. Line two baking sheets with aluminum foil. (Use baking sheets with rims to contain grease).
2. Place strips of bacon on the baking sheets. I found that each baking sheet held about half a pound without any overlapping of strips.
3. Put the baking  sheets in the COLD oven. Then close the door and turn the oven on to 400.
4. Bake. The original recipe said to bake for 17-20 minutes. Mine took closer to 30. They are done when they turn a golden brown without being or looking crispy.
5. Take them off the baking sheets as soon as they are done and transfer them to a tray of paper towels. Do this right away. I mean it.
6. Eat. They are juicy, delicious, and reasonably mess free!

The original recipe called for baking a whole pound on a single baking sheet. I don't see how that would be possible without seriously overlapping the strips. I think that would result in just one big sheet of bacon. The Jedi might not see a problem with this outcome. The Jedi might want to use this outcome as our new kitchen curtains. Mmmmm,says the Jedi,---bacon curtains, how could they be wrong?  I just used two baking sheets and kept my bacon well separated to avoid domestic decorating disputes.

My next cooking adventure will be a chocolate volcano cake. Somehow a science lesson on Venus led to me promising Toa of Boy that we'd make a volcano cake together. I'm considering two recipe options. One is from the Pioneer Woman, because you can't go wrong with Ree. And one is a hot fudge cake which I've made before with success.

We'll see which one Toa prefers.