My friend Martin Golding is happy to report that deep frying is an excellent way to make up sufficient quantities of bacon for large gatherings of hungry campers.
One of his tasks this past weekend was to make breakfast for ~70 people in a camping environment. With a deep fry set up, Martin was able to crisp up 13 pounds of bacon in less than an hour.
Will deep frying bacon make it unnecessarily greasy? One person out of the 70 thought so. If this were a vegetarian free event, Martin would have addressed that issue by deep frying it in unhydrogenated lard.
I’m sorry- and you were still chewing on the concept of bacon being deep fried let alone in lard… I’ll give you a moment to digest the image of a bacon & lard melange.
As if crispy bacon wasn’t enough reward, the left over cooking oil picks up a smoky bacon flavor that is reportedly excellent for making potato crisps.
Deep fry update from Martin:
“Premium bacon contains less water, and cooks faster.
Eggs can be deep fried, but it’s not pretty. I’ll be working on that.”
More large scale cooking recipes and ideas
- Camping Meals for Over 100 People: Having a good bunch of volunteers made this meal work out really well. Our planning paid off and we were able to easily prep our menu items with out being rushed. It was fun- as feeding hungry people generally has been in my experience.
- Spreadsheet of ingredient amounts and purchase quantities for my greek(ish) meal for 115 people: Inspiration: antipasto dishes, light foods for picking at in warm weather, easy to eat with one utensil, good items for individually building a huge glorified salad. Good items with grilled meat.
11 Comments
Oh man….bacon and lard, guess there weren’t any Jews there. Haha. Thanks for sharing.
Sounds like a great time! I love outdoor cooking and have even put together easy menu ideas for large groups that you would probably enjoy!
I am thrilled to discover that other people think of things like this, and then actually do them.
By the way, I still haven’t gotten the bacon bourbon to work, but I’m not giving up.
Oh- a slice of crisped bacon steeped in a bottle of boubon?
I’m there!–McAuliflower
Man oh man! I’ve got three kids (now grown) and for a good 10 years or so, I would wake up on Sunday mornings to my kids and a crowd of their friends hungry for pancakes and bacon. I wish I knew about deep frying the bacon back then! Thanks for sharing!
Where does one ever find genuine non-hydrogenated lard these days? Sure I can find hydrogenated lard anywhere but not even the good butcher shops in Seattle seem to have ‘the real stuff’…
I don’t know about the Seattle area, but I’ve found good lard sold in Hispanic Markets. There is also the option of rendering your own. Using my Food Blogs search to the right will yield several hits on how to render your own lard. Here’s one method from eGullet and one from MeatHenge.
Best of Luck
–McAuliflower
it’s the only way I order bacon in New Jersey…otherwise its floppy (an ‘ew ew ew’ in my world). not greasy, just delish.
as a side comment on the deep fried eggs. i new a guy that swore by them, but only made by his father. he had a ‘special’ cast iron skillet that was devoted to the cause.
I was about to order “guaranteed non-hydrogenated” Maple Leaf lard from canadaonly.ca, but the shipping cost from Canada stopped me. I had heard such good things about cooking with lard that I bought Lundy Lard in a big pail from the local grocery. It doesn’t say one way or the other if it is hydrogenated, but I expect it is. Anyway, I tested my biscuit recipe with it and was disappointed. A faint bacon grease flavor and the biscuits were heavy and crumbly. I went back to using my Spectrum non-hydrogenated palm oil shortening. With it, I get light fluffy biscuits with just a touch of crispiness on the outside. I didn’t test the lard for piecrust or frying yet.
Forgot to say that if you want to order the non-hydrogenated lard from Canada Online, you can find it under “Baking Supplies”, and it is called Tenderflake Lard (made by Maple Leaf Co.) It is really too bad that none of the manufacturers in the US make a non-hydrogenated lard.
Leidy’s out of Souderton, PA makes unhydrogenated lard. It is labelled just “Pure lard” which is legal because that is really all that is in it. You find it in the refrigerated section at grocery stores in the Philadelphia area; can’t say about other places, but if you track down a butcher it is really easy to render your own from fatback.
Deep fried eggs? They’re called Egg Foo Yong and have been around for quite a while. I use Egg Beaters: 1/4 cup Egg Beaters, some raw onion and canned bean sprouts. I confess to adding a little MSG (Accent).
Mix and pour into hot oil. Cook for a few minutes, flip (very carefully) and cook a little longer. Absolutely fabulous with left-over homemade chicken gravy. I have to tell you, it was pretty scary the first time I tried this. When you first pour the eggs into the oil, they sort of foam up (a lot). Just be sure to have two large spoons ready to to push the foaming mass together.
This also happens when you flip the eggs, but to a lesser degree. Now, I have to try the deep fried bacon…
Hmmm- I beg to differ. Egg Foo Yong is a pan fried omelette style dish, not deep fried.
–McAuliflower
Great, thanks for sharing this blog article.Really thank you! Really Great.
