Sous Vide Bacon
Sous Vide Bacon is the perfect solution to perfectly cooked bacon that can easily be meal prepped for many recipes! Cook a large batch all at once and store it for later or pan fry for a crisp breakfast or brunch side dish.
Sous Vide, pronounced “soo-veed,” is a simple cooking method that uses an immersion circulator to cook food in a water bath. This allows for very precise and even cooking temperatures, which means your food can’t overcook or undercooked.
Sous vide is often used for restaurant cooking because of these precise temperatures, but it is also great for home cooks to make chicken, steak, or vegetables!
✅Can you sous vide bacon?
Yes! You may wonder why anyone would use sous vide to cook bacon when they can cook it in a pan immediately. These are the best reasons to cook bacon sous vide!
- You can make pre-cooked bacon in large batches. This means it will be fully cooked and ready for pan searing right out of the bag and ready for your breakfast plate!
- Endless seasoning ideas. Season your bacon with any number of spices, herbs, and sweeteners before cooking sous vide.
- You can control the level of tenderness. This is great if you like your bacon on the chewy side or crispy side or if you like bacon with a bite.
- Great for meal prep. You can cook a large batch of bacon, portion it out for the week, and crisp an individual slice of bacon or many for cooking eggs, egg bites, or your favorite dishes.
🥓What You’ll Need
Thick Cut Bacon – Having thick-cut bacon strips to sous vide is very important. Regular-cut bacon can fall apart easily.
- Immersion Circulator – The best immersion circulator is by Anova because it’s top-of-the-line quality and has a great app that connects with your phone. You can also use a budget-friendly brand such as the SAKI or InkBird brand.
- Vacuum Sealer – Use any basic vacuum sealer with your sous vide. You can also use these sous vide bags with hand pump for about $15.
- Vacuum Sealer Bags – Purchase a set of different sizes for ease and variety.
- Large Pot or Sous Vide Container – If you’re cooking a lot with the sous vide, it’s helpful to have a container that’s perfectly sized to hold the immersion circulator and the food its cooking. Otherwise, you can use a large pot or heat-safe container.
- Sous Vide Clips or Sous Vide Weights – These accessories are made to keep the food submerged in the water while it cooks to make sure it cooks evenly. You can purchase these or use a heavy kitchen utensil and binder clips.
Check out The Best Sous Vide Accessories for a perfect cooking experience!
💧Water Displacement Method
Don’t have a vacuum sealer? The water displacement method works by using the principle of Archimedes, which states that a body submerged in water is buoyed up by force equal to the weight of the water displaced by the body.
This means that the heat of the surrounding water cooks the food in the sealed bag without coming into direct contact with the water. This cooking method is often used to cook delicate foods such as fish, eggs, and vegetables. You can use the water displacement method to properly secure your fish for sous vide using the following steps:
- Place your food in a Ziploc freezer bag, making sure to get as much air as possible.
- Seal the bag most of the way leaving a small opening at the end to let air escape.
- Submerge in the water letting the air come up to the top using the pressure of the water.
- Once the bag is submerged up to the seal, close it fully before fully submerging into the water.
🍲How To Sous Vide Bacon (Instructions)
Preheat your water bath: Add water to your desired sous vide container and set your sous vide machine to the desired temperature. We recommend cooking bacon at 145°F.
Add bacon to sous vide bags: Place the bacon in a single layer in sous vide bags, making sure not to overcrowd them. You can cook multiple bags of bacon at once.
Vacuum seal the sous vide bags: If you have a vacuum sealer, use that to remove all the air from the sous vide bag. You can use the water displacement method if you don’t have a vacuum sealer.
Add to water bath: Place the sous vide bags in the preheated sous vide bath. Cook for 8 hours, depending on how crisp you like your bacon. You can also cook overnight sous vide bacon and cook for up to 12 hours.
Finish: Transfer bacon from sous vide bags, pat bacon dry with a paper towel, and cook in a cast-iron skillet over medium-high heat for 30-60 seconds on each side flipping with tongs. An easier way is to cook them in the oven, or air fryer to your desired level of crispness on the exterior.
👩🏻🍳Sous Vide Bacon Cooking Tips
- Use a sous vide rack: If you have a sous vide rack, use it to keep the sous vide bags from floating. This will help the bacon cook more evenly.
- Purchase high-quality bacon: Not all bacon is created equal. We recommend using thick-cut, high quality bacon for sous vide.
- Don’t sous vide bacon in the original package: The plastic that the bacon comes in is not meant to be heated and can melt or leach chemicals into the water.
- Season the bacon: You can season the bacon before cooking with your favorite seasonings. We like to use a little bit of smoked paprika, garlic powder, and black pepper.
- Don’t cook too long: You can keep the bacon cooking for up to 12 hours. Any longer than that and the bacon will start to get tough.
- Try different temperatures: Different temperatures will result in different textures. 145°F is our recommended sous vide bacon temperature, but you can experiment with lower or higher temperatures to find what you like best.
🧂Seasoning Ideas
The possibilities are endless when it comes to seasoning sous vide style bacon. Here are a few of our favorite flavor combinations:
- Smoked paprika, garlic powder, and black pepper
- Brown sugar, cayenne pepper, and chili powder
- Maple syrup, Rosemary, and Thyme
- Honey, Dijon mustard, and Sage
- Brown sugar, cinnamon, and Nutmeg
🧊Storage and Freezing
- If using for meal prep: Place the vacuum-sealed bacon in an ice bath for 5 minutes to bring the temperature down before storing in the fridge. Sous vide bacon will last 7-10 days in the fridge.
- Freezing sous vide bacon: Once cooled, place the sous vide bacon in freezer-safe bags. Sous vide bacon will last up to six months in the freezer. Let it thaw overnight in the fridge before using your favorite finishing method.
🦞More Sous Vide Recipes
- Sous Vide Baked Potato
- Sous Vide Asparagus
Sous Vide Hollandaise - Sous Vide Lobster Tails
- Sous Vide Bison Burgers
- Sous Vide Burgers
- Sous Vide Catfish
- Sous Vide Pot Roast
Sous Vide Bacon
Equipment
- Sous Vide Weights
Ingredients
- 16 oz Thick Cut Bacon
Instructions
- Add water to your desired sous vide container and set your sous vide machine to the desired temperature. We recommend cooking bacon at 145°F.
- Place the bacon in a single layer in sous vide bags, making sure not to overcrowd them. You can cook multiple bags of bacon at once.
- If you have a vacuum sealer, use that to remove all the air from the sous vide bag. You can use the water displacement method if you don’t have a vacuum sealer.
- Place the sous vide bags in the preheated sous vide bath. Cook for 8 hours, depending on how crisp you like your bacon. You can also cook overnight sous vide bacon and cook for up to 12 hours.
- Transfer bacon from sous vide bags, pat bacon dry with a paper towel, and cook in a cast-iron skillet over medium-high heat for 30-60 seconds on each side flipping with tongs. An easier way is to cook them in the oven, or air fryer to your desired level of crispness on the exterior.
