From my experience at working at many different restaurants that had bacon, none of them deep fried their bacon. All of their bacon was ordered from another company, which arrived at the restaurant on the same scheduled days every week in a box. The bacon wasn’t raw like the bacon we get from grocery stores. It was pre-cooked and ready to go. The only thing needed was for it to be heated.
The method that the restaurants used to heat the bacon was with a microwave or a conventional oven. The bacon arrived to the store in a box that had the bacon layered and separated with papers in a plastic covering.
The bacon was separated from the paper and laid back on the same paper, and then placed in the microwave for about 30 seconds to a minute. Then, it was removed after the pre-cooked bacon was crispy, and placed in a warmer until it was ready to serve.
When they were using a conventional oven instead of a microwave, the same pre-cooked bacon was used, but placed on aluminum foil, and ran through an oven for 1 minute at the temperature of 350 degrees Fahrenheit. It produced similar results as using a microwave, but the bacon wasn’t as crispy.
The restaurants never used raw bacon from the grocery store, unless it was an emergency, because they ran out of the pre-cooked bacon from their supplier. They never used the pre-cooked bacon at grocery stores either. They always ordered big boxes that consisted of 300 pieces of bacon or more.
Is Deep Fried Bacon A Thing?
Deep frying bacon isn’t really a thing that people do as often, because of a lack of equipment. Most restaurants don’t deep fry their bacon because, as mentioned, they have cheaper methods to be able to prepare good bacon that most customers are satisfied with.
Microwaving or putting fully cooked bacon in the oven is just a more efficient way altogether instead of using oil and a fryer in most cases. Frying food can get messy with the grease and seldom grease splashes that happen while cooking.
Restaurants don’t typically buy the equipment to deep fry food unless most of the food they are making requires it. Even when a restaurant uses a commercial deep fryer, the bacon they use is still pre-cooked and just thrown in the microwave or oven if they have it.
Commercial deep fryers are expensive, so restaurants won’t buy them unless they absolutely need one. They require a lot of cleaning, safety procedures and equipment, and maintenance when using one. Doing all this to just deep fry bacon just isn’t efficient to most restaurants. Also, the building the restaurant is renting or owns has to have the plug-ins and set up already made for hooking up a commercial deep fryer if they were to buy one anyways.
Of course, they could use a small one, but cleaning more equipment at the end of the day than necessary is a daily inconvenience.
This doesn’t mean that deep frying bacon doesn’t happen, it is just less common. Using a frying pan is the most common way that everyone is taught, even over a microwave and oven.
At one of the restaurants I worked at the bacon was deep fried for a little while because the restaurant was temporarily ordering raw bacon from another source instead of the pre-cooked bacon they usually receive. They didn’t have a really good way to efficiently cook the bacon in a timely manner without making a mess, so they deep fried it in their commercial deep fryer, since they already had one. It was quicker, easier, and the bacon actually came out better with more taste than the pre-cooked bacon.
How To Deep Fry Bacon
Deep frying bacon when you already have a deep fryer isn’t all that difficult. This is what you need to do..
- Set the temperature of the oil to 350 degrees Fahrenheit for the deep fryer.
- Wait for the temperature to reach that temperature, then take the frying basket out of the grease if it is in it.
- Place the bacon inside of the frying basket.
- Place the basket in the grease and wait 1 minute and 30 seconds for the bacon to cook.
- Take the basket out of the deep fryer and remove your bacon.
The bacon should look thoroughly cooked. If it doesn’t then place the bacon back in the deep fryer at an interval of 30 seconds. It doesn’t take very long for the bacon to finish cooking at this temperature, so it needs to be checked frequently.
Why Is Restaurant Bacon So Much Better?
The bacon that restaurants are using most of the time is bought from other companies. It is already pre-seasoned and fully cooked before it arrives at the restaurant. The bacon bought from these companies specialize in making bacon in large quantities to restaurants on a regular basis, so more time is spent on making better bacon.
The bacon they use is also thinner and more finely cut than the bacon that is often seen in grocery stores that we typically buy. Despite it being thinner, it is held together better because it has more meat, resulting in leaner slices.
The bacon doesn’t have a portion consisting of all fat connected to the meat as found in grocery stores. If it does, then usually it is a lot less. Some could even argue that the bacon is healthier than the bacon at home because it is leaner with less fats. Of course, it is possible to buy lean bacon at grocery stores too, but just not in large quantities in boxes like restaurants do when they order their bacon supplies from the independent companies selling them the bacon.
Unless you plan on buying and eating a lot of bacon all the time, then it is best to stick with buying it at the local grocery store. You might need an extra freezer too, but it is definitely possible to deep fry bacon.
