The Clever Way To Cook Bacon For On-The-Go Snacking

Praise be to the keto diet for declaring bacon as an acceptable snack food. Or, maybe, you're from the Ron Swanson school of thought, where bacon has been and will always be your snack of choice. No matter how you view it, this breakfast staple has its place as a rich protein that can satisfy hunger pains. This explains the rise of "purse bacon," a viral way to make it that's ideal for fitting it in your bag for later snacking.  

First mentioned on a TikTok by @hollyatkinson1, purse bacon is made by folding your meat into three stacked segments before being placed onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Once roasted, these compact pieces of bacon offer short rectangles of chewy, porky perfection. While this hack was initially used to make a full bacon slice easy to fit into a handbag, it has a bonus side effect of creating more surface area on your sheet pan to roast even more pieces.  

To start off with, you'll preheat your oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Next, you'll arrange your tri-folded pieces of bacon onto the sheet pan. A quick note on what type of bacon to use — stick to regular bacon, as thick cut-bacon will not cook properly. This is where the hack comes in clutch for those wanting to cook a bunch of bacon all at once. You can jam these bacon packets as closely together as you like, as this won't affect the way they cook. With this in mind, you can fit almost two pounds of bacon onto one sheet pan. You'll bake them for 20 minutes, flip them, then bake them for another 20 minutes.

Individuals who have tried this tip have noted the bacon is definitely chewy rather than crunchy, so if you're going for crispy bacon, you might want to skip this one. Still, if you're looking to incorporate a bunch of bacon into a jumbo Cobb salad, baked potato bar, or even a frittata, this hack may help you with meal prepping. Or you can just embrace the bacon's true purpose as an on-the-go snack.