Love Crispy Bacon? Reach for a Little Flour Before You Cook It

Name a better way to wake up than the smell of bacon cooking. When you start the day with a salty, crispy, and delicious strip of bacon, you know it’s gonna be a good one.

While I love eating bacon, I definitely don’t love cooking it. It’s messy and tricky to get just right. Because of that, I have done my fair share of testing bacon tricks, like cooking a whole pack at once in a saucepan and adding 1/4 cup of water to the pan. But this bacon cooking video I saw on Instagram last week stopped me in my tracks. 

Now, I had heard about sprinkling a little flour over bacon strips already. In fact, The Kitchn ran a story about it a few years ago. But dipping the entire strip in flour is something I hadn’t seen before, and neither had the rest of the team. The video promises “extra crispy bacon.” Naturally, I had to see if we’ve been missing out on something brilliant.  

1. Dip your strips in flour. Pour about half a cup of flour onto a plate. Dip each bacon strip in the flour, flipping once, so that it’s completely coated.
2. Bake your bacon. After coating, place each strip on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper or aluminum foil. Bake in a 400°F oven for 14 to 18 minutes, or until the bacon reaches your desired level of crispiness.

I have to say that before trying this bacon hack, I thought I was a chewy bacon girl. That changed today. The bacon that came from this flour hack was so crispy and crunchy, it altered my breakfast preferences forever.

It was surprising to find out how many people in the comment section have tried this trick before. “Been doing this for 30 years,” one wrote. “My Grandma did this,” another said. Maybe I’m just living under a rock.

I don’t normally cook bacon in the oven — even though I know that is so many people’s preferred method (something they love to tell me about whenever I write about bacon) — partly because I have an unreliable oven but also because I’m impatient. So I kept peeking at my strips to see how they were cooking. Every time I checked, the strips were the same color and looked to be cooking very evenly. There were no strips that looked simultaneously burnt to a crisp and raw — a common problem that comes with cooking bacon in a skillet. 

My strips were super crispy. If you’re nervous about them being too crunchy, maybe take them out around the 16- to 18-minute range (I left mine in for 20). While I want to say that this is the best piece of bacon I’ve ever had, I know I might say that again when I try a different trick. I just love the fatty breakfast food so much! However, I think I might seriously mean it this time. 

This post originally appeared on The Kitchn. See it there: Love Crispy Bacon? Reach for a Little Flour Before You Cook It