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Bacon, Toasted
Take thin slices of bacon, place them on the pins of an ordinary toaster; turn as required. They are more delicate if held on a fork before the fire, and if placed between the common wire toasters they can be easily turned when one side is browned. Fat bacon should be cut tolerably thick for toasting or grilling, lean bacon somewhat thinner. Serve on a hot dish. Probable cost, 10d. to 1s. per pound.
A method rather than a formula: bacon cooked by radiant heat rather than in its own fat. The modern equivalent is the grill or broiler, and the original's advice on thickness is the part worth keeping.
- The open fire, translated"Before the fire" means radiant heat from one side only, which is what a broiler or overhead grill gives. Set a rack about 4 inches below a preheated broiler element and turn the slices once, when the first side has browned.
- Thickness is the hingeThe instruction to cut fat bacon thick and lean bacon thin is sound and still ignored. Fat renders and shrinks under direct heat, so a thick fatty rasher ends up the right size; a thick lean one dries and curls before the fat has done anything useful.
- Toasters and pinsThe "ordinary toaster" here is a standing wire or pronged frame set before the hearth, not an electric appliance. The "common wire toasters" are the hinged double-mesh sort that clamp the food so it can be flipped in one motion, which a grill basket now does.
- Buy it cut, or cut it yourselfBacon of this period was commonly bought as a side or flitch and cut by the cook or grocer rather than bought ready-sliced, which may be why the recipe discusses cutting at all. Supermarket rashers are pre-cut at a single thickness; ask a butcher or buy a piece of streaky and slice it if you want the fat cut thick.
- Fat under the grillRendered fat dripping onto a hot element will smoke and can flare. Use a pan with a rack over it and pour off the drippings partway through if a lot collects.
- TimingThin rashers take about 2-3 minutes a side under a hot broiler, thick fatty ones 4-5. Go by colour, not the clock, and pull them a shade paler than you want since they firm up off the heat.
- The cost note10d. to 1s. per pound is the price the book quotes for its own market, not a grade. It marks bacon as an everyday food rather than a luxury; there is nothing in it to convert.
- Serving"Serve on a hot dish" matters more than it sounds. Bacon fat congeals fast on cold china and the rashers go greasy and limp; warm the plates.
In a house with an open range, a rasher held on a fork or clipped in a wire toaster cooked in a minute or two without dirtying a pan, and the fat fell into the fire or a dripping pan rather than sitting around the meat. The care taken over the thickness of fat versus lean also points at a period when bacon was bought as a side or a flitch, cured at home or by a local grocer, and cut by the cook to suit what she meant to do with it.