Oven Cooked Bacon No Mess Method.

Cooking Bacon in the oven. The taste and texture of bacon in the oven is amazing!  

The problem with cooking bacon in the oven is it can be really messy. The grease not only pops and splatters on your oven walls and window, but the fumes carry the grease all over your oven walls and window, building up over time. We built a brand-new house and installed a double oven. After about 6 months I noticed that the window was very hazy and had something built up on it. The bottom oven window was like new so I started to investigate. We came to the conclusion it had to be the bacon grease in the fumes from when we cooked bacon. At that time, we didn’t use our oven for much more than cooking bacon, so I knew it had to be the cause.  

No problem, that’s what they make the oven cleaning setting for right? Well after a few hours and our oven getting super-hot while smelling up the whole house it was time to check out the inside. Let’s just say besides a few ashes at the bottom of the oven and a now much higher electric bill, nothing else had changed. The side walls and window still had gunk on them.  I used a couple different cleaners after trying vinegar and backing soda with no luck. I had to use a green rough sponge to clean the sides and a razor blade to clean the glass. It was pretty tedious work to say the least. 

We loved the taste of bacon from the oven so what could we do to help slow down this problem. We found the solution. 

We bought some custom size baking sheets from Nordic Ware, they come in so many sizes that you can find one that will fit your oven perfectly. They are made from heavy duty aluminum. We also found parchment paper that was just a couple inches over size of our baking sheets. This was perfect!  

You line the parchment paper on the bottom of the baking sheet, it is over sized 2 inches in length and width. This gives you an inch on all four sides to overhang the baking sheet and capture all the grease in. Just take one hand and press down on the paper while with your other hand you can press the paper against the sides of the baking sheet creasing the paper to make a grease capturing sheet of parchment paper. Watch our YouTube video on this page to get a good visual of this technique.   

Place your bacon in a row separating each piece so they don’t touch.  

Set your oven to preheat at 400 degrees. 

Now the most important part that saves your oven! Take another sheet of parchment paper and lay over the bacon on the baking sheet. This will keep all the grease from splattering on your oven walls and window. It also cuts the fumes way back so it doesn’t build up so quick on the inside of your oven.  

Place the covered bacon on the covered baking sheet in your oven right away. Don’t worry about it being preheated to 400 degrees yet. It actually helps that the oven isn’t super-hot and the bacon can start to heat up with the oven. This keeps the bacon from popping and splattering when you put it in the oven as well. You know when you take cold bacon and put it in a hot pan it pops and splatters. Same thing in the oven. The cold bacon reacts to the hot temperature and the water inside the fat explodes.  

You want to cook the bacon for about 20 minutes or less if you like your bacon chewier and limper. We love our bacon crispy. If you are cooking multiple pans at one time it would be good to rotate them about midway thru the cooking time, so they cook more evenly.  

Take the baking sheet out of the oven when your bacon is the doneness you love. Lay it on a hot pad or towel. Grab the top parchment paper in the middle on both the left and right sides. Lift it up and fold into itself, letting any grease drip off. Then fold over one more time long way, then in half. Take it to the trash now without dripping grease across your kitchen. 

The bottom parchment paper should have captured all the grease rendered from the bacon. Remove your bacon slices and lay them on a plate or in an air tight container for storage.  

This is a great time to save the leftover bacon grease for cooking other things. Bacon grease will keep unrefrigerated on your counter for months on end. It just needs to have the bits and pieces of bacon strained out of the grease and kept in an air tight container. You can buy very nice bacon grease storage containers and we will put some links at the bottom of the page of our recommendations. 

If you have a mason jar with a screw on lid that will work too. Just take a paper towel and fold it in half doubling the thickness. Lay the center of the paper towel in the mouth of the jar and push down a little to make an indentation, like a cup. Pour the cooled but still liquid bacon grease into the indention slowly and let it strain thru the paper towel. A coffee filter works well too, but paper towels are cheaper. You may have to stop a couple of times and let it catch up straining as it runs into the jar. When done throw away the paper towel and put the lid on. It can sit out on your counter for use anytime you would need oil or butter. It adds such a great flavor to other foods.  

Your bacon is ready to eat or you can store it in an air tight container for 2 weeks in the fridge or 3 months in the freezer. To reheat we suggest taking a few pieces and putting in an air fryer or in a skillet to reheat till warm. 

We use our bacon throughout the week in different recipes and other foods. Bacon, egg and cheese omelets are easy when the bacon is precooked and ready to crumble inside the omelet. We love them on Carnivore bread or biscuits. The possibilities are endless.