We Tested 7 Ways to Make Bacon — One Was the Clear Winner

From frying to grilling and baking, we put bacon cooking methods to the test. Here's what came out on top.

• Baking bacon on a foil-lined sheet pan at 400°F for about 22 minutes yields evenly crisp, flat strips and lets you cook up to 10 slices at once — the test kitchen’s clear winner.
• For smaller batches, starting bacon in a cold cast-iron skillet slowly renders fat, keeps shrinkage minimal, and turns out consistently crispy slices in roughly eight minutes.
• Microwave, sous vide, hot-skillet, grill-pan, and air-fryer methods produced tough or uneven bacon, demanded more hands-on attention, or couldn’t match the oven’s capacity.

As far as I’m concerned, bacon goes with just about everything. From melty egg sandwiches and grilled burgers to crisp salads and even sweet ice creams, that combination of salty, savory, and slightly smoky flavor is the perfect complement to any meal of the day. When it comes to how bacon is prepared, however, there are really two camps — one for those who like an evenly crispy, well-rendered strip of bacon, and another for those who like it a bit chewier.

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