Bacon Salt

• Ingre­di­ents:
• 2 pounds thick-cut bacon
• Chunky salt (sea salt or Mal­don salt work espe­cial­ly well)
• OPTIONAL: Brown sug­ar, spices, pep­per flakes

Lay out the bacon in a cold skil­let and cook over low heat, pour­ing off fat as it ren­ders and tak­ing care not to burn the bacon.

When the bacon has cooked as far down as it seems it will, remove the bacon from the pan, blot it with paper tow­els, and place it on a sheet pan in a 200° oven or a food dehy­dra­tor. Pour off fat or blot the bacon as need­ed. This may take 4 to 6 hours, but excess fat may cause the end prod­uct to have a clumpy tex­ture or taste rancid.

When the bacon is com­plete­ly dry, crum­ble it as fine­ly as you can with your hands or in a food proces­sor. Shock­ing­ly enough, there will still be more fat left, so place the bacon bits in a paper tow­el and blot as much as you can. You may even return the bacon to the oven and cook for an addi­tion­al 1 to 2 hours. What you’re look­ing for is bacon dust.

Once the bacon is as dry as pos­si­ble, place it in a mea­sur­ing cup, then mea­sure out the same quan­ti­ty of salt. Com­bine the two using a food proces­sor, spice grinder, mor­tar and pes­tle, or by plac­ing the bacon and salt in a paper bag and crush­ing them togeth­er with a rolling pin.

Add spices, pep­per, or sug­ar to taste, and store in lid­ded containers.