The Absolute Best Way To Cook Slab Bacon, According To An Expert

Store-bought bacon is certainly easy to cook, despite the greasy mess it can make on the stovetop. Sometimes, however, you might want to experiment with a different type of bacon. For example, making homemade slab bacon allows you to skirt the preservatives and also gives you more control over the flavors. You can stick with classic black pepper, but there are many other ways to season and cook homemade slab bacon, according to Greg Gatlin, a James Beard Award finalist for Best Chef and founder of Gatlin's BBQ and the recently opened Gatlin's Fins & Feathers in Houston, Texas.

"I'm somewhat of a traditionalist when it comes to bacon! Kosher salt, butcher grind black pepper, brown sugar, red pepper flakes, and real maple syrup are my best practices for seasoning slab bacon," Gatlin says. "I like giving something that's somewhat sweet a little heat." If you want to stick with Gatlin's traditional-but-flavorful seasoning, all that's left to do is cook the pork belly when it's ready. "Smoking bacon with hickory is my recommendation. It's pungent enough with[out] overpowering as well. The heat source needs to be indirect at around 200 degrees [Fahrenheit]."

If you don't have a smoker, you can smoke the slab bacon on your grill on the back deck. And if you don't have a grill at home either, baking the slab bacon in an oven set at 400 degrees Fahrenheit for about a half hour is another technique that will work. Keep in mind that baked slab bacon won't have that same smoky flavor profile. When the timer goes off, there's an easy way to know it's ready, but you'll need a meat thermometer, like this one available on Amazon. "The target internal temperature is 150 degrees [Fahrenheit]. At this point, you will have some wonderfully seasoned and smoked slab bacon," says Greg Gatlin.

You will likely be quite tempted to chow down on the slab bacon as soon as it's done cooking, but there are some ways to make it a more complete meal. An obvious choice is to add it to your next breakfast spread, maybe paired with soft and fluffy scrambled eggs and our easy pancakes. Then there are the less-conventional ways to use it. Dice the slab bacon and fill corn tortillas to make tacos with a pineapple or mango salsa to cut through the meat's richness. You can also adapt our maple bacon Brussels sprouts with the pork, transform it into bacon jam for sandwiches, or mix it into your favorite salad to give it a punch of meaty umami.