I learned to cook bacon from my mother, and her method was in the microwave oven. So naturally this was how I cooked bacon for the longest time. But the only downside to this method, it that at times it can be messy, and the final results can be inconsistent.

I’ve seen a ton of different methods for cooking bacon: on the grill, frying pan, microwave, and the oven. Personally I’ve become a big fan of cooking bacon in the oven. It’s great if you want to make a lot of bacon, and it’s one of the cleanest methods that I know of for cooking bacon. One of the bonus items about cooking in the oven with a jelly roll pan, is that you can save the melted bacon fat for other uses (like making scrambled eggs.)

I’ve tried and used plenty of different brands and styles of bacon. But my normal everyday bacon is Sugardale Hickory Smoked Bacon 23/30 Ct., and for a 10lb box at Sam’s Club it is only $22.42, which is a pretty good price, since I go though about a box a month.

I kind of laugh because my sisters best friend picks on me, because I do most of my grocery shopping at Sam’s Club or Costco, even though I live by myself. So she finds that even more humorous.

Yeah I live alone, but I look at it from a cost savings standpoint. You just can’t beat the prices of buying in bulk. Personally I use a lot of shredded cheese, mostly mozzarella and mild cheddar. At Sam’s Club I can buy a 5 lb bag of shredded mozzarella for $8.33, or $0.833 for 8 oz. of cheese. If you wanted to get cheese that cheap at the grocery store, you would have to wait for a sale. And even then you can only get the store brand cheese for $0.99 for 8 oz. So I’d rather not wait for a sale, when I can buy it cheaper in bulk, and just freeze the rest. Its just common sense (or cents) for me.

Back to cooking bacon, and the cook times couldn’t be more straightforward. Pre-heat an oven to 450F. While the oven is pre-heating, fill up a jellyroll pan with bacon. Don’t worry about overlapping the bacon, since it will be shrinking quite a bit in size during the cooking process. After you’ve filled up the pan or pans with bacon, put the bacon in the oven for 10 minutes. After that first 10 minutes, pull the bacon out of the oven and flip the bacon. After flipping, put the pan back into the oven and cook for another 8-10 minutes. This is when the cooking process gets a little tricky depending on your oven, and the kind of bacon you are using. Since in just 30 seconds the bacon can go from soft cooked to super crispy/burnt very quickly. So check after 8 minutes, and then every 30 seconds afterwards.

One other thing to keep in mind is that the bacon will continue to cook for a little bit, after you pull it out of the oven. So pull the bacon out of the oven just a little bit before your desired doneness level. One other thing, cook the bacon one pan at a time. I tried once to cook two pans at once, and it didn’t come out the same. So take the time to cook it one pan at a time.

Now make the biggest BLT you’ve ever had.