What do you do with bacon grease???
My wife cooked a lot of bacon on Easter for our green beans (organic, but store bought) and we have quite a bit of bacon grease from that. Does anyone have ideas or suggestions for what to do with this flavorful fat? It goes good on popcorn, but there is way too much for using with popcorn and nothing else.
Comments
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Yes, use it to make mayonnaise. It will be delightful and makes a wonderful potato salad dressing. I also use it to fry potatoes, when cooking other items that are helped out by the bit of savory flavor.
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@An Mayonnaise! What a great idea. We don't do much frying but we love mayonnaise.
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Pretty much... EVERYTHING! Use it to season cooked greens or beans.... fry potatoes and onions in it... mix it into mashed potatoes, dip bread in it.... use it in biscuits, use it in salad dressing... use it in brownies... fry hamburgers in it...pour it hot over spinach... use it in almost any food application you can imagine!
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@judsoncarroll4 thank you.
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Totally forgot the absolute best - roast fresh sweet corn and then slather it with bacon grease! Also great for frying cornbread, or in baked corn bread.... or with baked sweet potatoes....
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Oh... and gravy.....
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Bacon grease seasons almost everything we sauté.
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I'd use bacon grease on most anything! My favorite ways, as others have mentioned, are to fry potatoes and onions, to make cornbread, and as a hot dressing for wilted spinach salad. Here's how I do it:
https://www.food.com/recipe/wilted-spinach-salad-73051
and here are 20 ways to use it, several of which have been mentioned.
https://thepioneerwoman.com/food-and-friends/20-ways-to-use-bacon-grease/
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We use it to fry parsnips. Gives them a wonderful flavour. A friend of mine uses bacon grease when she makes beer bread.
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I keep it in a container & use it to season my cast iron. It is what I use whenever I cook anything in those pans, with the exception of eggs & potatoes. I prefer butter in that case, because if I don't, everything seems to stick...and I like butter.
My MIL makes greasy leather pancakes (my thoughts anyway) that my husband absolutely loves. They are a very thin pancake much like a heavy crepe, yet still way different. I will have to find the recipe for you.
Thin Pancakes
1 c. Flour
2 Eggs
1/2 tsp. Salt
Milk to make a thin batter
Fry with equal parts lard (bacon grease works) & butter (she used margarine) each time before a new pancake. She poked a little hole in the middle of each & put more fat in that hole. It takes some practice to get them just right. They always ate them with white sugar & rolled them up.
For me, texture, sweetness & grease was way too much for my stomach. I can handle them better if I don't smother them in grease & sugar.
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Thank you all for great ideas. The list of 20 ways from the link @Mary Linda Bittle gave us is also great.
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@LaurieLovesLearning the pancake/crepe recipe sounds fascinating. Bet it was one of the foods which have deep childhood memories for him
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Bannock also works. I love bannock!
Fry it in a cast iron pan or form it around the end of a stick & bake it over a fire.
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@tomandcara You are correct. I don't make it often because I get frustrated trying to make them work & I don't like them, so that doesn't help.
My oldest daughter has no issue making them work, but she is now gone from home.
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We love using bacon grease to cook with. Almost anything we saute is done in bacon grease if we have it. Need to eat more bacon, so we have enough to try out some of these suggestions. Never would have thought to put it on corn or in brownies. Thanks for all the great ideas.
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Second the idea of using it to make charro beans. The recipe I use came from Allrecipes.com, and I altered it a bit to my taste. Here is the recipe I use, with my changes incorporated:
Instant Pot® Charro Beans
Prep Time: 20 m Cook Time: 55 m Servings: 8 servings
INGREDIENTS
4 cups water
2 cups dry pinto beans, rinsed
1 large onion, chopped
1 can Rotel tomatoes
1/2 cup roughly chopped cilantro, or to taste
4 cloves garlic, minced
4 teaspoons chicken bouillon
1/2 teaspoon chili powder
1/2 teaspoon ground paprika
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
~1/4 c. bacon grease
DIRECTIONS
Combine the dry beans with 1 T. baking soda in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Cover and allow to sit for one hour or overnight. Drain, then rinse very well before starting soup.
Combine water, pinto beans, onion, Rotel, cilantro, garlic, chicken bouillon, chili powder, paprika, cumin, and black pepper in an electric pressure cooker (such as Instant Pot(R)). Close and lock the lid. Select Bean/Chili function; set timer for 90 minutes. Cooker will reach high pressure in 10 to 15 minutes.
Release pressure using the natural-release method according to manufacturer's instructions, 10 to 40 minutes. Unlock and remove lid.
(My note: if you double this recipe, you can freeze approximately two gallon ziplocs of charro beans and still have enough for two or three meals (as sides).
NUTRITION
Per Serving: 184 calories; 0.7 g fat; 33.9 g carbohydrates; 11 g protein; 0 mg cholesterol; 114 mg sodium.
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Yum! Thanks for all of the ideas, everyone!
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If you have a dog put some on his food, not alot gives them a really nice coat.
I love carrots and parsnips cooked in bacon grease!
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Oh My! You got me with the word bacon! There are a bunch of ideas that I will be trying from this question! I have always saved my bacon grease because I do use it for cooking when I want to add a smoky flavor to something, you don't have to use a lot just enough to get the flavor. I also used it for homemade dog food to ensure the correct crude fat content. Mine is stored in the refrigerator and seems to stay just fine. My grandmother used to keep it on the counter but I can't go through it that fast before it would go rancid. Depression era generations didn't "waste" a thing!
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I’ve never had too much bacon grease 🤣. But if I do need to keep awhile I strain it to remove any bits of meat. Fried cabbage is one of my favorite ways to use it.
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I just put it in a mason jar and keep it in the fridge...and use it for whatever :) I usually use it to fry eggs, meats, veggies, whatever.
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Much the same as the rest. We heat a little in AM for the dogs food and she loves it. We also got a nice container with a strainer on our stove so we can pour it off and have it be a lot cleaner.
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Haluski! Cook cabbage and onions in bacon fat and butter, serve over egg noodles with sour cream (and bacon, if you haven't eaten it all). This recipe is a favorite of all my Polish and Ukrainian friends. At first, is sounded odd to me, bt it has become one of my favorite recipes, too!
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love the recipes Thank you again for great ideas!
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@judsoncarroll4 Yes, that dish immediately told me it was Ukranian/Polish...just everything about it is so. I spent my teen years in a very Ukranian area.
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Many of my best friends are Ukrainian and Polish. I firmly believe that they have one of the the top cuisines of the entire world. No one can match their sausage. Such beautiful people and such a grand history and culture!
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@judsoncarroll4 Haha...I will have to disagree with you...and it depends just which sausage you are referring to. Do you mean extremely garlicky sausage (my cousin's Polish husband made it, & you could smell it a mile away) or kielbasa?
I am biased. I much prefer Mennonite farmers sausage. 😋 😁
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I have Rytek Kutas' book on sausage.... I can't even begin to describe all they do.... It isn't even an art, it is a lifestyle!
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So many good ideas!!!
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I agree. Sausage making+culture= lifestyle. There is history & family pride. Most recipes have generations of their own history. This is what makes them good. It is all about the love that goes into each batch.
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