Bacon Cups, Six Ways

Bacon Cups, Six Ways

Listen up bacon lovers. You can turn bacon into ingenious edible bowls. Consider the possibilities: bacon egg breakfast cups, breadless BLTs, beans in bacon, potato and cheeeeese, salads in crunchy bacon bowls, bite-sized bacon appetizers, bacon in bacon…

The mind reels at the possibilities.

Ring ‘O Bacon

The bacon’s not really a bowl in this case, but rather a ring holding an egg or other oven baked ingredient. Essentially, you start with either pre-cooked or halfway-cooked bacon molded into a circle in a muffin tin and crack the egg into it. Be sure to coat the muffin tins with cooking spray. There are,of course, other variations, including adding avocado or putting a circle of toast at the bottom of the regular-size muffin pan.

Not Martha’s Upside-down Muffin Tin Method

Preheat the oven at 400 degrees.
Carefully wrap foil over the back of a muffin pan. For cup shapes use the back of this Wilton King-Size Muffin Pan. These are the width of jumbo muffins but are almost twice as tall. Do not coat with cooking spray, it may be easier to remove but the bacon won’t hold its form as well.
Use three layers of bacon on the sides and weave it like a basket. Keep in mind that the bacon will shrink so don’t skimp with just two layers.
Cook the bacon, moving the pans around, until crisp looking and waited for it to cool before removing the foil and shaped bacon. Expect some breakage when removing from the foil so make extra!

Thanks to not martha for posting how to do this.

Mini Bacon Cups

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
Turn a mini muffin pan upside-down and lightly coat the bottom with nonstick pan spray.
Crisscross 3 slices of bacon over each upturned cup, and then place another mini muffin pan on top so that the bacon slices are compressed between the two pans. Place the pans on a rimmed baking sheet and bake until the bacon cups are crisp and browned, about 20 minutes.
Remove the baking sheet from the oven and set aside to cool completely. Lift off the top pan.
Carefully remove the bacon cups from the bottom pan and place them on a paper-towel-lined baking sheet to drain, wrong side up.

Open Bacon Cups “basket” using 10-oz Ceramic Ramekins

This method ended up creating large open spaces which look really cute when filled with fresh green salad. I didn’t overlap the pieces on this try and used fattier pieces of bacon which shrunk up more and created larger spaces in the cup.

Line a Pyrex baking dish with a bunch of paper towels. Then take two sheets and fold in half or thirds depending on the size of your ramekins, joining to make a single long rectangle. Wrap it around the ramekin and tuck under the paper towel on the open edge. Set it back in your baking dish, open end down, on top of the paper towels.

Put two pieces of bacon across the top with one piece perpendicular. Next, wrap the bacon around in a basket weave, over under the three pieces. Cover and microwave for up to 4 minutes. Gently lift the cup off of the ramekin and peel back the paper towel.

The Bacon Mat-Weave Method

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Turn two muffin tins upside down, and cover the outside of 9 cups with aluminum foil. Set aside.
Weave the bacon into a mat that is 9 strips across and 9 strips wide. Cut into 9 even squares. Place each square over one of the foil covered muffin cups.
Bake the bacon in the preheated oven until crisp, about 10 minutes. Remove the bacon cups from the pan and allow to cool completely. Once cooled, fill each with some lettuce and tomato halves. Top with shredded Cheddar cheese. Serve at room temperature.
Totally Out of Control Bacon Soup bowl
Kabapu at Instructables demonstrates how to construct a double-layered, full-size, soup bowl that calls for a heat gun and mini-torch. We love the dedication —and the excess!

Bacon Cups with Less Guilt!

Try turkey bacon.

Use a small cereal bowl that is microwave safe Line a plate with a paper towel, then line the exterior of the bowl used to create the bacon bowl with paper towels (I used 2). Take three slices of turkey bacon and drape them over the paper towel-covered bowl to form what looks like a star. Next weave the remaining 2 slices of bacon in and out of the draped pieces (My bowl just fit 2 slices around). Cover with another paper towel and microwave for about 4 minutes. Remove carefully from the microwave with oven mitts and gently remove the outer section of paper towel. Lift the bacon off the bowl form and gently remove the paper towel from the inside.

Fill with lettuce, tomatoes, and blue cheese, top with blue cheese dressing. Serves 4.