In my early 20’s I worked in a commercial kitchen where I learned how to cook perfectly crispy bacon in big batches with next to no effort. The trick? We cooked the bacon in the oven. Cooking bacon in the oven means no splattering grease, no standing over a hot skillet, and you get perfectly flat and evenly cooked bacon every time. Realizing that bacon didn’t have to be cooked in a splattering skillet was one of those 🤯 moments. So if you’ve never tried this easy trick for cooking bacon in the oven, you’ve got to give it a try!
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Why Cook Bacon In the Oven
Cooking bacon in the oven has become my go-to method because there are several benefits over cooking bacon in a skillet. Here are some of the advantages:
- It’s hands-free. You just pop it in the oven and it does its thing with no need to flip or babysit the bacon as it cooks. You’re free to use your hands to cook eggs, toast, or whatever else you’re making for breakfast.
- It’s easier to batch cook. You can cook more bacon at one time in the oven than in in a skillet, which makes it perfect for feeding a crowd or if you’re meal prepping.
- The bacon cooks flat. If you plan on using your bacon for sandwiches, wraps, or anything where you need the bacon to be less curly, baking it in the oven is the way to go. It also cooks extremely evenly.
- There’s less mess. When you bake bacon in the oven the splatter is contained within the oven, which means no greasy countertops to clean up afterwards or hot grease burning your skin. To reduce the splatter inside the oven, you can lay a loose piece of parchment over the bacon as it bakes.
What Temperature For Bacon in the Oven
To cook bacon in the oven, 400ºF is the best temperature. The high heat helps yield crispier bacon slices. Thick-cut bacon will take about 15-20 minutes to cook at 400ºF, but the exact time can vary. Make sure to check the bacon after 15 minutes and add time depending on your desired level of crispiness. For thinner bacon strips, check after 10 minutes and add time as needed.
Tips for Crispy Oven-Baked Bacon
To make sure you get the most delicious and crispy bacon in the oven, follow these tips:
- Use a wire rack. Elevating the bacon above the grease allows it to drain away as it cooks and keeps the bacon crispy. For chewier bacon, skip the wire rack.
- Use foil for easy clean-up. Foil captures the grease as it cooks and allows you to easily pour it into a storage container for later use.
- Fully preheat the oven. Make sure the oven has preheated for at least 10-15 minutes so the bacon gets a fast hot blast of air. This helps the bacon crisp up nicely.
- Use thick-cut bacon. While you can bake thin cut bacon, it can become quite delicate when baked. Cooking thick-cut bacon in the oven yields a deliciously crispy bacon with a nice crunch.
What to Serve with Bacon
Make your breakfast complete with Homemade Biscuits, Cheese Grits, and maybe some Scrambled Eggs with Spinach and Feta. Or go classic with a simple fried egg!
How to Use Leftover Bacon Grease
Leftover bacon grease is pure gold. It adds SO MUCH flavor to whatever you use it with. You can pretty much use it to cook anything in place of butter. Try some of these yummy uses for your bacon grease:
- To fry potatoes or eggs
- Use to sauté greens, like kale, spinach, or even green beans
- Make stove top popcorn
- Spread on your bread when making grilled cheese
- Use in place of butter in Fried Cabbage with Noodles
How to Cook Bacon in the Oven
Servings 10 slicesIngredients
- 12 oz. thick cut bacon
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 400ºF. Prepare a large baking sheet by lining it with aluminum foil and then placing one or two wire racks on top to hold the bacon above the surface of the baking sheet.
- Lay the strips of bacon across the wire rack so they are close, but not overlapping.
- Bake the bacon in the fully preheated oven, for 20-25 minutes*, or until it has reached your desired level of crispiness. Begin checking the bacon at 15 minutes, as ovens can vary.
- After baking, use tongs to remove the strips of bacon from the wire rack to a paper towel lined plate. Serve immediately.
- Allow the remaining bacon grease to cool for about ten minutes, then pour off into a bowl or jar, and reserve for another use.
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Equipment
- Enamelware Sheet Pan
- Wire Cooling Racks
- Enamelware Dinner Plate
Notes
Nutrition
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How to Cook Bacon in the Oven – Step by Step Photos
First preheat the oven to 400ºF. Prepare a sheet pan by covering it with foil and placing one or two wire racks on top.
Lay the slices of bacon out on the wire rack so they are close, but not overlapping.
Bake the bacon in the preheated oven for 20-25 minutes (for thick cut bacon), or until it reaches your desired level of crispiness. Begin checking the bacon at 15 minutes, so you’re aware of its progress (every oven is different). I like mine extra brown and crispy, so I let mine go closer to 25 minutes. If you’re cooking thin bacon, begin checking the doneness after 10 minutes.
Although most of the grease drains away as the bacon is baked in the oven, some will pool on the top, so I still use tongs to transfer the cooked bacon to a paper towel lined plate.
Let the bacon grease cool for about 10 minutes on the foil so that it’s still liquid, but not burning hot. Then pull up the sides of the foil to capture the grease, and pour it off into a bowl or jar.
Cover or close the container with the grease and refrigerate until you decide what food will be graced with its presence. If you strain out the small bits of bacon and debris the bacon grease can last months in the refrigerator. But I know I’ll use it quickly, so I don’t bother to strain!
Crispy oven-baked bacon perfection!!
This is the best way by far to cook bacon. Turns out perfect every time: my secret is to break eggs on the pan after I’ve taken out the rack and the bacon, skip it back in the oven for a minute or two, and you have perfectly cooked over easy eggs, and one less pan to wash. You can put the rack back on top of the eggs with toast on top, and make a big batch of toast as well.
This is a great way to cook bacon! Since I live alone, I don’t use more than two slices at a time. Instead of having all that extra bacon sitting around where I can grab a piece out of the fridge to snack on (I love bacon!), I cook it until it’s almost done and put it in the freezer. When I need bacon, I can take out however much I need and stick it in the microwave to cook till it’s nice and crisp.