Why Throwing Out Your Bacon Grease Is A Huge Mistake

It's bright and early in the morning and you've just finished a steamy session cooking up some bacon in the kitchen. A pool of the grease is still sizzling in the pan, slowly coming to a stop. What you do once it fully cools down could have the potential to either exponentially elevate your upcoming recipes, or it could deprive your future meals from the upgrade they so deserve. Whether or not you discard your bacon fat is the deciding factor between the two, and we can confidently say that to do away with it would be a huge mistake.

Reusing oil is no foreign concept. It's not only cost-effective and reduces food waste, but it also imparts a touch of new flavor on whatever dish you conjure up next. While that means you should be careful with recycling oil used for particularly potent ingredients, such as fish, it's not a problem when it comes to bacon. The grease left behind after frying those strips of pork can be used in a myriad of other ways in the kitchen, and it'll be sure to leave behind a deeply savory flavor while it's at it.

Unlike some other ingredients that might not mix well with every type of recipe, bacon is a very universal food. The scientific reason bacon tastes good with everything is on account of the meat's makeup. This cured meat is full of many compounds that each have their own particular taste or smell. When the fatty acids within these compounds come together with sugars in the presence of heat (your very hot frying pan), a whole bunch of distinctly irresistible flavors are created and released.

These meshed components pleasantly impart their umami quality to whatever dish you add the bacon grease to. It'd be a real shame not to try it out, as the savoriness of the bacon fat acts as a flavor enhancer, lending its meaty taste to whatever it touches. You can get a whole lot of the pork belly's other characteristics along with that, including its signature rich, smoky flavor. The grease will be sure to add depth and complexity to your dishes because of this.

Bacon is so versatile that it can be added to way more recipes than you could imagine, especially since there are so few foods out there that wouldn't benefit from some of that extra umami flavor. From entrées and sides to snacks and desserts, there's a lot of room to experiment when it comes to incorporating bacon fat. Even your popcorn will taste like heaven with one simple swap. And what would that be? You guessed it — doing away with vegetable oil and popping the kernels in bacon grease instead.

Surprisingly, vegetables benefit from the stuff, too. Cook your canned green beans in bacon fat, and you'll never look back when you get a taste of that smoky goodness. Whether incorporated into the dressing you pour on your salad or used as the oil you fry your veggies in, plenty of other greens will take on a delightfully deep flavor with bacon fat. Try it out with Brussels sprouts, asparagus, collards, and kale to start.

It might sound a bit odd, but you can also try counteracting the sickly sweet profile of certain desserts with the savory elements provided by bacon. Add a bit of the meat's grease to something like chocolate-chip cookies or maple ice cream, and watch how a perfectly balanced, sweet yet salty creation is born. Really, you can test how well bacon grease pairs with almost any other food in addition to these, whether that means using it when you're making a chicken marinade, scrambling eggs, or brewing soup.