Bacon substitution

Question

I do a great simple dish that involves bacon so I'm interested whether there is a vegetarian substitute for bacon. It would be quite useful having one since I use it all the time.

Here's the recipe:

I make small ball doughs that I boil for a couple of minutes until they are a bit firmer. In the mean time I fry bacon pieces (not slices but small square pieces) and eventually add dough balls to bacon and add sour cream.

Asked by rlesko

Answer

Bac'n Bits are, in fact, vegetarian. They're a passably good crunchy garnish.

There's also Bacon Salt; which has many variety and spin-off products. It's vegetarian and kosher!

Answered by KatieK

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How long can you keep bacon (from a butcher) in the refrigerator?

Question

I bought smoked bacon from a local butcher and I want to know how long I can keep that bacon in the refrigerator. It is an all natural product with no preservatives other than the process by which it was cured, so no nitrates etc. I forgot to ask the butcher thinking it would be gone before it became an issue.

Asked by Varuuknahl

Answer

Most cured products last 7-10 days in the fridge although you most likely will see a quality drop off before then at around day three or four. You can also freeze the bacon for up to two months and thaw for use to extend the shelf life.

Answered by sarge_smith

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Curing bacon with a wet brine, without nitrates

Question

When making bacon, many of the recipes call for a dry brine using curing salt with nitrates. I've read that it is possible to use a wet brine without the curing salt with the nitrates and just use Kosher salt (or some other salt). Is this possible and safe to use just kosher salt and water? From my understanding curing salt with nitrates can be toxic, but also protects against botulism but I'm still looking for a safer alternative.

Answer

Salt inhibits bacterial growth mainly by drawing moisture out of the meat. A wet cure (brine) would be substantially less effective at this than a dry cure, unless you add much more salt to your brine and, also, you take the extra step of drying the meat afterwards. Besides, the texture of the final product is likely to be substantially different, possibly not in a good way.

As you alluded, potassium nitrate (a/k/a saltpeter) is used in cures because, strangely, it does indeed stop the growth of Clostridium botulinum, the bacteria that causes botulism. Other salt cures do not have this property, which might explain why some recipes call for adding a little powdered ascorbic acid to the salt. Hopefully, however, you are not planning to leave your bacon in a vacuum-sealed bag at room temperature, so this should not be a major factor in which cure recipe you use. I would be far more concerned about generating carcinogenic nitrosamines from frying nitrate-laden meat.

For extensive discussions, see the USDA/FSIS bacon fact sheet and the University of Georgia smoke-cure fact page, as well as the University of Minnesota's fact page on nitrites.

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How long will bacon grease keep in the fridge?

Question

I kept all of the bacon grease from making bacon this weekend, and now I have a jar of solidified grease in the fridge. How long can I use this to impart bacony goodness to my fried vegetables before it goes bad?

Answer

Depends on how many solids and how much water you have in it. If you've rendered, filtered, and refined it, it should last a few weeks easy.

Note: my mother maintained it never EVER went bad, refrigerated or not. Lot of old time southern cooks will say the same, but they all go through it fast.

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How long can I reuse this delicious bacon grease for cooking?

Question

I cooked some bacon about a week ago and left the grease in the pan. I've used it the last two nights with great success for cooking other meals.

How long is it safe to reuse? I figure since I'm heating it up to a million degrees each time I use it it's probably pretty safe, but.... I'd rather not get food poisoning.

Answer

Is it safe? maybe. Is it recommended? No.

If you're going to save bacon grease (or other fats), I'd recommend:

1. straining it
2. putting it into a different container to minimize the surface area exposed to air
3. keeping the container in the fridge.

Although, the first one, I admit I don't do -- as I'm not cooking bacon every day, I've generally used up my supply by the time I've got more ... so I fill a glass jar, and let solids settle to the bottom ... then just use the stuff off the top as I need it, until I get so far down the jar that I hit the darker strata, when I then dispose of the whole thing. (I recycle jars for this, then pitch the whole thing ... you don't want to go washing bacon grease down the drain, it does nasty things to your pipes)

...

If you're going to do what you are, you'll want to make sure that you hold the pan at 250°F (121°C) for at least three minutes, preferably longer, to kill off botulism spores, unless you're fond of that whole paralysis thing.

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What is the difference between pancetta and bacon?

Question

I see pancetta next to the bacon at a local butcher and was wondering what the difference was between the two?

Answer

I addition to what Tabiasopdenbrouw said, and more to the point of usage/taste:

1. Bacon is typically cut thinner and ends up crispier than pancetta.
2. Both are often rendered for their fat before adding onions, peppers, etc... to the pan to pick up those pork fat flavors.
3. Pancetta is often saltier in flavor though this is usually the case because the pancetta is cut thicker or into dices, so you get bigger bites of it and thus more salt. This is the biggest different between the two.

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How can I make bacon powder?

Question

I want to make bacon powder, I assume the means cooking all of the fat out without burning the meat. Is this right? if so how should I do this? If not what should I do? How should I turn the bacon into powder? just in a blender?

Answer

My wife loves bacon that's cooked to the cusp of burning, so I've got a good knowledge of the properties of bacon on that fine line. It's so brittle, you can powder it very easily.

I myself would probably just stick it in a plastic bag, and whack it a few times with a pan, but I don't see any reason why you couldn't put it in the blender. I have a nice mortar and pestle I use for powdering things, but that's probably overkill in this case.

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What kind of cooling garnish is like ice cream but doesn't melt?

Question

In a related question, I asked about plating with bread for sampling chili. Here I need to find a cooling, as in take the heat off the capsaicin with fats, garnish.

For this question I would like to know how to garnish. I am making a bacon and pulled pork chili, and need a smooth, subtle garnish to take the edge off the peppers. First off, I will be dusting the top with a mixture of nutritional yeast and a smidge of dround coffee and ground, dried orange rind.

Initially I was inspired by the idea of a bacon flavored ice cream, served to the side of the bread with a hal strip of maple-smoked bacon candied in the oven with light brown sugar. The idea of being able to have a whole spoon of chili and then a nibble of the garnish is very appealing.

I pitched the idea at a friend and added, "but I don't want it to be frozen, or to melt." The cold would be impossible with the heavy texture of the chili, and melting would disturb the dusted topping.

We came up with a mixture of sour cream and cream cheese, with a bit of arrow root as a coagulant (since it will be semi-cold, I want it to retain some stiffness on the surface of the chili). Basically, blend it all up with some of the bits of candied bacon and some spices, then chill it over night in the fridge to marry the flavors until competition time.

• What ratio would the above mixture need to be relative to arrow root (I haven't used it before)? By the teaspoon, tablespoon, fraction of a cup per cup of dairy?
  • Is there a better coagulant for the purpose
  • Are there any flavor/textural issues with arrow root that I should be aware of to begin with, and specifically in the context of sour cream / cream cheese?
• Is there a better solution to fit the problem; that is, what other kind of ice cream like garnish could I use that would resist melting for a bit of time and would have a smooth texture and be able to nibble on with little scoops from the spoon?

Answer

I'd avoid a coagulant if you can, it will likely keep this dense on whats already a rather dense sounding dish.

Personally, I'd beat loads of air into your sour cream/cream cheese mixture and serve a small whipped dollop of it. It will keep it light and still offset your spiciness a little. If the pork chili is the star, keep it complimented but not complicated.

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Is there a method for desalinating bacon?

Question

Bacon contains a rather large amount of salt which can pose problems for people who are trying to find ways to reduce salt in their diet.

Is there some method that can be used to reduce the amount of salt in bacon?

Answer

If you're buying bacon at the store, and trying to reduce the actual sodium in the product you've just purchased - you're out of luck. Like most things, you can't un-salt it. You can reduce the flavor, but in your case, the sodium is still there.

Alternative options include:

• Buy reduced sodium bacon
• Make reduced sodium bacon
• Use less bacon, in order to reduce the total sodium intake.

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Is it safe to eat smoked bacon without grilling?

Question

The reason I ask this is due to the fact nothing on the bacon packaging indicates it can or cannot be eaten 'raw' and in general eating raw meat is a bad idea.

Answer

In such a case, for any food item, ask yourself a question: In a 19th century household, would it have been kept in the cellar, or eaten immediately?

For bacon, it is common knowledge (or at least I think everybody knows it) that it was kept in a cellar for long time. So this is definitely not a food which perishes too quickly. You can eat it raw. (In fact, I often do when I need a quick sandwich). It can be a bit tough to tear apart with your teeth, so pre-cut it.

The reason for this is that bacon is cured meat. There are two reasons not to eat raw meat: taste and food safety. Taste is individual, some people are OK with the taste and eat raw meat as long as they can find a source of meat fresh enough (think sashimi, carpaccio, steak tartare). Food safety is not a problem with bacon. The process of turning pork to bacon includes salt and smoke. Both of these kill bacteria, create an environment which is not hospitable to new colonization (dry, salty), and give the meat a new flavor which is better than the raw meat.

If you are now asking yourself why we are bothering with the fridge for bacon and other ex-"cellar foods" at all, there is still a reason. First, most of us don't have a convenient cellar at 12° - 15°C, and not only is the bacon's life shortened if kept at usual kitchen temperatures, it also doesn't taste too good. It is just greasy. Second, you seldom get dry bacon at the supermarket; even if the curing process doesn't include brining, bacon is often aged much less than in old times, and then packed in vacuum, so it doesn't get really dry on the outside. So bacteria could very well start growing on it outside of the freezer. Inside the freezer, it keeps much longer than raw meat, and is certainly OK for consumption without frying. I guess that the popularity of fried bacon is mainly due to taste reasons.

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