Bacon

What is bacon? About the ingredient bacon. Including 1,230 recipes with bacon, nutrition data, photos, and where to find it.

Contents

1. About
2. Nutrition facts
3. Where found
4. Food group
5. Weights & measures
6. Recipes1235
7. References
8. Related

About

Check out our Bacon Survival Guide for tips on cooking and storing bacon.

Bacon is a cured meat prepared from a pig. It is first cured in a brine or in a dry packing, either containing large amounts of salt; the result is fresh bacon (also green bacon ). Fresh bacon may then be further dried for weeks or months (usually in cold air), boiled, or smoked. Fresh and dried bacon must be cooked before eating. Boiled bacon is ready to eat, as is some smoked bacon, but either may be cooked further before eating.

Bacon is prepared from several different cuts of meat. It is usually made from side and back cuts of pork, except in the United States, where it is almost always prepared from pork belly (typically referred to as "streaky", "fatty", or "American style" outside of the US). The side cut has more meat and less fat than the belly. Bacon may be prepared from either of two distinct back cuts: fatback, which is almost pure fat, and pork loin, which is very lean. Bacon-cured pork loin is known as back bacon.

Four 14-gram (0.5 oz) slices of bacon together contain 7.45 grams (0.26 oz) of fat, of which about half is monounsaturated, a third is saturated and a sixth is polyunsaturated, and 7.72 grams (0.27 oz) of protein. Four pieces of bacon can also contain up to 800 mg of sodium, which is roughly equivalent to 1.92 grams of salt. The fat and protein content varies depending on the cut and cooking method.

Bacon is usually high in salt and saturated fat; excessive consumption of both is related to a variety of health problems.

Recipes using bacon

There are 1235 recipes that contain this ingredient.

All 1,235 recipes

Created: March 23, 1999 Last updated: over 2 years ago