Lazarus Cooke wrote:
> In article >, schachmal
> > wrote:
>
>> I like bacon but I can never cook it without shredding it as it
>> glues itself to the pan, no matter how much oil or butter I put in
>> first. It sticks within seconds and trying to turn it over causes it
>> to rip into pieces. I'm begining to think that even if I deep fried
>> the rashers in a pot the depth of the Marianas Trench that it would
>> still glue itself to the bottom.
>>
>> As I'm using olive oil (usually) with a stainless steel professional
>> pan (18/10) I'd like to know what I'm doing wrong or if its the
>> quality of pig we have in Australia.
>>
> It's not the quality of the pig, but the quality of the curing
> (although the pig may not have seen much sky). Your bacon has been
> pumped full of water during the cure to make it weigh more. If any -
> repeat /any/ liquid comes out while you're trying to fry it, it's duff
> bacon. It's the stuff dissolved in this liquid which glues everything
> to the pan.
>
> Unfortunately it's very difficult, even in London, to buy decent
> bacon. I have to go to a market stall. But look for "dry cure" bacon.
>
> Lazarus
I totally concur with what was written above, but would add that there's a
trick that can help, but is absolutely not guaranteed, it depends on the
amount of water that was pumped into your bacon, but just quickly rinsing
each cut in running cold water before patting them dry with absorbing paper
can largely diminish the amount of stickyness, by removing the surface
buildup of foreign matter, as can starting your frying in a hot pan,
lightly greased, in order to seal as quickly as possible the lower surface
of the bacon and make it sweat by the upside and not the downside where the
sugars used to retain water *will* stick to the pan, but if your bacon was
highly watered look out for heavy spatter of scalding fat.

And yes if you can look for dry-cured bacon.

Hope this helps,

--
Salutations, greetings,
Guiraud Belissen, Chteau du Ciel, Drachenwald
Chris CII, Rennes, France