Chef Matt Walsh - The Bacon Master
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
182.78699
Summary
In this episode, we discuss the art of cooking perfectly cooked bacon and how to get it done so that it tastes delicious and tastes good. We also talk about some of the most common mistakes people make when it comes to cooking bacon, and how you can fix them.
Transcript
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this is actually the most important thing we'll discuss today and that's because one of the
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biggest problems today in my view is that most people in the country don't know how to properly
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cook bacon and now everyone says they love bacon right and this has been a an internet meme for
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years where people go on and on about how much they love bacon yet most of the time i know you've
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had this experience you go to someone's house you stay the night you wake up the next morning they
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make breakfast they make bacon and then and then you feel grateful for that but then what they put
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in front of you is an abomination it's either burnt to a crisp thereby robbing it of all its
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bacon-y flavor or it's undercooked and flimsy and and has the consistency of microwave taffy
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or it's both it's kind of burnt in parts and then undercooked in other parts and it becomes this
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pockmarked uh leprous monstrosity so i'm going to do a psa for you guys i want to show you an example
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of perfectly cooked bacon i'm going to show you a picture of of of what it looks like this actually
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is bacon that was cooked by one of the great chefs of our time speaking of being one of the best in
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the world at something and um one of the great chefs of our time that is me and i want i want to
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show you this picture here it is now you see there and please leave this photo up for a minute
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first of all you see only four pieces and now that could remove all of my credibility as a chef
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if i only made four pieces of bacon because who does that what sort of deranged lunatic only makes
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four pieces of bacon well i will inform you that i ate three of the pieces before i took that picture
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i ate three of the pieces leaving four um to split among my family and that's four members of
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the family so they each got one i got three actually after i took the picture i had one more so
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i got four and then they split the three between them and because you know that's what generosity
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is all about but anyway what you see here is um i want you to notice this bacon is firm it's got
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the nice singe the nice blackened edge all around it's got the reddish brown coloring all throughout
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each slice it's very consistent the perfect mix of of tender and crispy not overdone not underdone
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the fatty parts are also cooked not burned but cooked melt in your mouth a brilliant job by me an
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amazing job by me now how did i do this well i put the bacon on a preheated skillet heated to medium
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high heat don't want it too hot don't want it too cool i put it on let it sit for about three minutes
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and then i flip it give it another couple minutes and now now that i've done a couple minutes on each
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side now i'm really just flipping it back and forth several more times and and i'm trying to get that
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perfect color and texture it's it's more of an art than a science cooking bacon though is all about
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vigilance it's all about loyalty heroism you can't leave the stove for any reason eyes on the bacon
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the whole time all of your senses dialed in sight hearing smell become one with the bacon tap into
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its essence okay you're not just you're not just doing this visual you also you're listening you're
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smelling you're feeling you're sensing it now what my wife will do she'll throw bacon on the stove
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and then she'll leave because you know one of the kids fell down the steps or something and she has to
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go check to make sure they don't have to go to the hospital wrong the kid will be fine he'll figure
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it out it's his fault for falling down the steps in the first place should have paid attention stay
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with the bacon baby's crying kids are screaming doesn't matter stay focused remember your priorities
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remember the great responsibility that you assumed on yourself when you open that package of bacon
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now you're the one who opened and now you're committed you have to see it all the way through
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and then here's the trick of course make sure to take the bacon off of the stove 90 seconds before
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it's done so you want to take it off and it's a little bit underdone the grease is going to continue
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to cook the bacon so you let the grease finish the job if you take the bacon off this is a big mistake
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people make take the bacon off when it looks perfect and you say oh i've got perfect bacon you want to
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call all your friends and family take a picture like i did by the time everyone gets into the room and
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you're taking the picture it's ruined it's done it's burnt why did that happen because it kept
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cooking for 90 seconds afterwards so you want to time it perfectly take it off 90 seconds before it's
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done and um and then you will have perfectly cooked bacon this is from chris says matt your
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disastrous and frankly dangerously heretical guidance on cooking the sweet ambrosia that is salty delicious
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pork belly simply called bacon by the untutored is nothing short of inciting
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vandalism you might as well champion drawing crayon mustaches on the mona lisa every man with an
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orderly mind and properly educated in the preparation of the gift god literally blessed mankind with on a
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tablecloth in the heavens knows it must be grilled only a searing well-seasoned grill provides the proper
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balance of heat and carbon required to allow the internal fat to reach just that crispy and tender
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homeostasis which yields a perfect sweetness that can set off any dish from omelets to oysters to only
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bacon indeed the only acceptable justification for cooking bacon in a skillet is a need to save and use
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the drippings to later infuse into a bottle of kentucky bourbon your distorted views on this topic
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make me question your suitability for any future tyrannical aspirations well chris i spent 10 minutes
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on my show talking about bacon while other shows are talking about breaking news important news like
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impeachment i'm sitting here talking about bacon okay that's the kind of commitment you get from me
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when it comes to this topic is there any other show hosts anyone else in conservative media anywhere
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who's going to spend 10 minutes of a show talking about how to cook bacon
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maybe there's a reason for that possible but that's what i did and and your response is to criticize me
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your response rather than writing me an email saying thank you so much matt for that beautiful
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presentation thank you for calling calling attention to this thank you for raising awareness
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about the proper way to cook bacon thank you for that you are a hero you deserve the nobel prize
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you are a genius you are a genius you know instead of that which is what i expect i get criticism
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unbelievable and you expect me to believe that you know how to cook bacon because you know cooking
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bacon comes down to character it comes down to what kind of a person are you and i firmly believe
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if you if you cannot properly cook bacon that's a reflection of your character it's obviously that you
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have character flaws one of them ingratitude so no i don't want your ungrateful bacon
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you don't need i showed you the the photographic evidence you saw it for yourself so maybe you need
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to expand your mind a little bit i don't need a fancy grill i'll put it on a skillet i could cook
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the bacon on a on a hot furnace okay i could cook it i could cook it on the street on a 90 degree
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day and it's going to look that good it's not about the tools you use chris it's about the it's
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about the the spirit the love that you put into it that's what i believe
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okay so danette has given us a picture of her bacon her bacon dish let's take a look at this picture
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that you sent danette here it is now i'm going to leave that up on the screen for a minute
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because we really need to get into this danette you want me to review the bacon
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but you can't get offended now remember you asked for this
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now um the management training course that i took for my assistant manager job at domino's when i was 19
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told me that you should always couch criticism with positive feedback as well so on a positive note
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i like the idea behind your dish i like your energy i like your hustle i like your commitment
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to pork i like the cheddar gravy idea all that is good very commendable unfortunately the execution
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is a disaster on the level of the hindenburg now this is supposed to be the finished product correct
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what we're looking at here so you've already cooked it if you've already cooked this
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then why is there raw bacon draped over the pork
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is the pork tenderloin raw too is that just a live pig hanging out under there
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i mean look at this bacon look at this bacon there is precisely one piece of bacon that is properly
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cooked on this entire dish and you could spot it yourself it's right there you see the horizontal
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strips of bacon at the bottom of the screen the one in the middle right there that is the only
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properly cooked piece of bacon and how do you know that it's properly cooked well you notice the
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coloring you notice the charred edges you notice the texture it's got all of the the hallmarks of
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a properly well-cooked piece of bacon so well done you you you did one nicely cooked piece of bacon the
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problem is there's like 20 pieces of bacon on that thing and i would never say that it's a problem to
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have 20 pieces of bacon it's only a problem when you don't cook the other 19 now really having that
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one well-cooked piece of bacon only makes the rest of it worse because then you get the you know now we
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can compare it so compare that to the vertical slice all the way to the far left um of the of the screen
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or no the far right depending on which way you're looking at this now notice it's it's sickly pale
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white appearance it looks like it has the stomach flu pale sweaty soggy just lying there a limp
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and you serve that to your family are you trying to kill them my god dinette this is if my wife
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served that to me we'd be in marriage counseling that's how bad it is now the the bacon does get
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progressively better as you go down the tenderloin but even the even the best cooked piece of bacon is
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not cooked very well at all so let me ask you this dinette do when you make meatballs do you just
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you know take the ground beef and and and grab a chunk of of raw ground beef and throw it on the
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table throw it in your husband's face here's your meatball is that what you do because that's the
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equivalent of what you've done here i can't look at this anymore i am i am shocked and appalled i have
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to assume that this is some sort of practical joke but um thank you for being a subscriber and uh thank
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you for for listening as well appreciate your support this is from laura says hello matt supreme
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leader of the world i come to you to have my husband's bacon judged he says that today it is
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perfect but you as the all-knowing will be able to tell me if it is or not i have attached a picture
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for you okay laura perfect bacon you say um well pride cometh before the fall but let's see here
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let's take a look at it this is the uh let's take let's put the picture up on the screen this is the
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supposedly perfect bacon there it is okay so i i think i get it now your husband meant that this is
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the perfect example of terrible bacon i think that's what he meant to say i'm going to assume
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that's what he meant to say because that would make sense in that context yeah okay so the coloring is
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okay the actual cook on the bacon is okay i'm not liking the color at the the top left corner there you
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see that bacon uh that piece is much darker than the rest so the incongruity the lack of symmetry there
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is very troubling to me then at the very bottom you've got that horizontal piece that looks sickly
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and looks like it has yellow fever or something um so that's a problem but uh all of that you know
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would only knock this bacon down to about a c plus so if i'm just going based on the cook and the color
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i'm going to say c plus not bad also not great the thing that drops it the rest of the way
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to an f and becomes grounds for deportation is the most obvious thing of all is the mangled twisted
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contorted shape of the bacon itself so what was your husband doing was he torturing the bacon to get it
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to talk i mean it's already dead someone let him know there's no there's it doesn't have anything
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to tell him what did the bacon do to him that made him feel like he had to draw and quarter it
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you know when someone puts bacon down in front of me i expect to see strips of bacon strips of bacon
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not mangled clumps of bacon a perfectly shaped strip neatly sitting there politely waiting for me to eat it
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okay i i want to see bacon that is proud um i don't want to see bacon that's begging me to put
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it out of its misery that's my problem now i uh i assume that when you saw this bacon by your husband
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your immediate response was to contact a divorce a divorce attorney and i don't blame you for that
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and i'm not saying that it would be wrong to divorce your husband for making bacon like this
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um i mean certainly legally ethically biblically you you would be well within your rights but look
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you got to think about the kids laura if you have kids if you don't then then get out of there as fast
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as you can if you do um you don't want to leave them with a man who prepares breakfast this way
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and so i'm you know i'm sorry that you're going through this in your marriage um i and i and the
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other thing is i don't blame your husband i blame whoever taught him how to make bacon
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that monstrous person and now i fear that he's going to pass that down to his own children
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and it's like a curse that will never end let's put a stop to it