Mmmmm Bacon. How to Cook it in a Pot Over a Fire
Getting Started
All you need is a pot, some bacon, parchment, tongs, scissors and a camp stove or rack that can be placed over a fire. You can also use your survival knife instead of the scissors, and tongs are optional. However, they do make manipulating the bacon easier as opposed to using a fork.
Preparing the Parchment
There are two different ways that you can prepare this recipe. First, you can fold the parchment into sections so it resembles an accordion or air filter. Then, you just add bacon strips between all of the sections, even those underneath. This will keep the pieces from sticking together. You can also roll the bacon and parchment together like a cinnamon roll. Both methods work well, but I think that the accordion option is slightly better.
The next step is to bend the parchment into a big circle and place it in the pot. You want it to be a tight fit but not too tight that you can’t squish it to one side. You will understand why as we go through the rest of this recipe, and it will be easy to get a feel for how much bacon to stuff in the pot once you try this out once or twice. You can also coat the sides of the pot with some butter or cooking spray in order to keep the parchment from sticking.
Rendering the Fat
Cover the pot with the lid and place over a low to medium flame. You want to slowly melt the fat so that it will soak the parchment and prevent it from scorching. This process should take about 3-5 minutes. Make sure that the heat is low enough to melt the fat without burning the paper. You can also add a little bit of water into the pot to create some additional steam and avoid scorching as well.
Cooking the Bacon
The fat and water will begin to collect in the bottom of the pan. Make sure that you keep the temperature low so that it steam cooks rather than fries, and avoid scorching the paper or bacon. Crack the lid open a little bit to allow steam to vent. You can also take the tongs and push the bacon to one side from time to time in order to vent steam. If you are using the accordion method, cut some lines in the top of each ridge so that steam can vent as well.
Take your tongs and grasp the entire roll and flip it over. Do this a few times so that the bacon cooks thoroughly and evenly. It should take anywhere from 30-45 minutes for the bacon to fully cook, depending on the thickness of the roll. Remove the roll with the tongs or a couple of forks, place on a plate and allow to cool before unfolding. Serve and enjoy.
It may take one or two tries to get a feel for how to cook your bacon to perfection, and feel free to improvise as you go. Try this out for yourself, and see how easy it is to cook up a batch of bacon that will be just as good as what you make at home on the stove.
