Candied Bacon

If there is a way to make bacon any better than it already is, this is it. Spicy, sweet, smokey, crunchy treat, what more could we ask, I ask you? I'm making this for breakfast but it would be just as good on a grilled cheese sandwich for lunch or served with (fill in the blank) for dinner. I'm having it with coddled eggs and strawberries with Rebecca Sauce, all covered in my last two posts. Now, if you're feeling angst over all the fat, nitrites, nitrates, blah, blah, and blah, well I can't do anything for you about that fat, but I can tell you to go to Whole Foods or possibly even your own grocery and get a natural bacon without all the bad stuff. I get the WF "365" house brand which costs about the same as regular bacon brands in any grocery. 

Here we go! Set the oven to 400 degrees. For one pound of bacon you'll need one cup of brown sugar and a teaspoon of chili powder. I have just about given up regular chili powder, except when actually making chili, for the deep sweet intense heat of this ground Chipotle Chili Pepper powder. BEWARE! This stuff is potent. Only use 1/4-1/2 teaspoon for this recipe or you'll be calling for a frozen Martguerita post-haste. Wait, this is breakfast - nix that Marguerita remark. So, fork these two ingredients together until all the little lumps are gone and it's bacon ready. Before you launch into that bacon though, get a pan ready to receive it. Use foil to line a broiler pan or any large pan with low 1" edges and top it off with a cookie rack or anything you have that will let the drippings through easily. Spray the rack well with cooking spray.

Now press the bacon into the mix, first one side and then the other and stretch it out on the rack. If you need to, make a few little ruffles to keep it from hanging over the edges of the pan. You want to be sure the drippings hit the pan not the bottom of your oven. Crumble a little extra sugar mix over each strip if you have any left over.  Ready to go in!

In the rare case of any leftovers, and I can't really imagine a scenario where this would happen, crumble up the remaining strips over a salad, add some strawberries and a good salty cheese like feta to balance out that salty sweet tangy mix. I used grated Mizithra cheese because that's what I had in the cheese bin and topped it off with Poppy Seed Dressing and almonds. Mmmmmm, mmmmm, mmmmm.

THE SHOPPING LIST:

1 Pound Bacon

1 Cup Brown Sugar

1 tsp Chili Powder or Chipotle Chili Pepper, Ground

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