recipe notes
step-by-step method
recipe card
If a slab of bacon had a kinky threesome with a little onion relish and some barbecue sauce, nine months later one of them would be giving birth to bacon jam. It’s that sleazy condiment you know you’ll love taking home and eating all night, but in the long run isn’t marriage material. Plus it’s just food so you’d be crazy to marry it…crazy enough to work. Wait, what?
I love bacon jam because you can slap it on so much stuff. It’s sweet and salty and smoky and spicy and just generally reeel good. What should you put it on? Oh I dunno… how about…hot dogs, burgers, fried chicken sandwiches, fried chicken fingers, fried chicken by itself, anything fried, grilled cheese, non-grilled cheese, French fries, poutine (shit I just thought of that and that sounds amazing), nachos, mac and cheese, biscuits, waffles…pancakes? French toast? I’m just spit balling here but my stomach is telling me any of those will work just fine.
recipe notes
Normally, this recipe doesn’t have any figs in it, but when I headed out to get my ingredients, I saw some beautiful figs that were just too good to pass up. That’s the jazz of cooking, and it’s exactly the kind of thing I encourage you to do! Play! Experiment! Will you mess up the recipe? Yup, sometimes, but that’s ok! Most of the time you’ll make something even better than the original and definitely something unique to you. Either way you learn and get better. More pearls of zen cooking wisdom to come.
I grew up on Heinz ketchup like everyone else, but I really recommend avoiding it in this recipe. It is so full of sugar that it can throw the recipe off in the long run. Best case scenario, make your own! But if homemade ketchup isn’t in the cards for you, I like “78 Red” brand ketchup. It has a ton of great flavor and works perfectly in this recipe.
bacon jam
ingredients
910 g bacon, cut into ¼” inch strips
2 large yellow onions, cut thin
110 g brown sugar
35 g garlic, minced
2 g ground cayenne pepper
1 g ground cinnamon
2 g ground nutmeg
235 ml bourbon whiskey
235 ml brewed coffee
120 ml malt vinegar
20 g molasses
120 ml maple syrup
240 ml ketchup
Figs
method
Start by finely chopping your onion and garlic and reserve.
If you plan to use figs like I did in this recipe, give those a dice as well.
Chill the bacon in the freezer for about 15-20min before cutting it to make the job a lot easier (and make sure your knife is muy sharp!)
A beautiful, thick cut slab of Nueske’s applewood smoked bacon!
Cook the bacon over medium-low heat in a large skillet. I use my 12” Allclad. This is an important part in the jamming process. You want the bacon to cook lightly and let some of the fat render out into the pan (you aren’t eating it for breakfast. Fully cooking the bacon can make it tough and jerky-chewy by the time the jam is done, a common mistake). It’s a lot of bacon, so I cooked it off in a few batches, dropping the cooked bacon into a strainer over a bowl to collect all the rendered fat and adding the next batch in the pan.
Chef’s Note: If the smell and sizzle of a pan full of bacon doesn’t get your culinary rocks off, please leave my site immediately and proceed to crunchyhippies.com.
Once all of the bacon is cooked off, go ahead and drink some beer. You’ve worked super hard and need to maintain proper fuelage to continue without injury. I also use this time to eat some of the bacon. You know, for science.
By the time the bacon is done, you should have a good amount of what I like to call pan gold on the bottom of your skillet. This is all of the beautifully caramelized proteins and sugars that add deep flavor to your dish (a process known as maillard browning that makes bread and steak, among much else, very good to eat). Once you add your onions, the water in them will deglaze the pan so make sure to take a pair of tongs or spoon and scrape all of that pan gold up to incorporate it into the onions.
Add a lid to the skillet and cook the onions over medium heat for about 7-10min, until the onions take on some color and turn slightly translucent. The lid will trap steam and help to cook the onion without overcooking or caramelizing.
Add the brown sugar to the onions and cook over high heat (to quickly boil out most of the water) until the onion is coated and starts to caramelize a little and thicken.
Add the garlic and cook for just 30sec to a min, stopping when the garlic becomes very aromatic but before it takes on color, which can make it bitter.
Add your bacon back to the pan along with everything else on the list (including in this case, the figs) except the bourbon and ketchup, which you’ll save for later.
Bring the mixture to a boil then reduce heat to low, and cook until thickened, stirring often (really scrape when you stir to mine any pan gold that might be lying about), for about 15min.
Add the ketchup and continue to cook, about 15min more. At this point be sure to stir frequently to avoid any burning or sticking on the bottom of the skillet.
Add the bourbon and cook for another 5min. It is my recommendation to drink some bourbon during this time, once again to replace vital calories and electrolytes lost while cooking.
You can jar/can the hot jam as is or you can give it a buzz in a food processor, blender or hand blender to smooth it out. I like to smooth it out because it really melds all the flavors, but this is totally a personal call.
To can the jam, fill your clean and sterilized jars almost to the top and tighten the lid securely.
Flip the jar over and place them in a saucepot lined with a towel.
Fill the pot with water until it reaches 1-2” up the side of the jar.
Bring the water to a simmer and let the jars sit, simmering, for 5min.
Let the water cool and remove the jars. Mission accomplished.
- 910 g bacon
- 2 yellow onions large
- 110 g brown sugar
- 35 g garlic
- 2 g cayenne pepper
- 1 g cinnamon
- 2 g nutmeg
- 235 g bourbon whiskey
- 235 g brewed coffee
- 120 g malt vinegar
- 20 g molasses
- 120 g maple syrup
- 240 g ketchup
- black mission figd optional
- Thinly slice the yellow onions and reserve.
- Mince the garlic and reserve.
- If using figs, dice them and reserve.
- Cut the bacon into 1/4" strips. Par-cook the bacon over medium-low heat, reserving any rendered bacon fat. Reserve the bacon.
- Without cleaning the skillet, add the the yellow onions and stir to deglaze the pan. Cook the onions over low heat, covered, for 7-10min until tender.
- Add the brown sugar to the onions and cook over medium-high heat until the water from the onions has reduced and the mixture thickens.
- Add the minced garlic and cook for 30 seconds.
- Add the bacon, and all other remaining ingredients except the ketchup and bourbon. Bring the mixture to a boil and reduce the heat to low.
- Let the mixture simmer over low heat, stirring often, until it is thickened, approximately 15-20min.
- Add the ketchup and continue to cook for 15min. As the mixture continues to thicken, stir more frequently to avoid burning.
- Add the bourbon and cook for 5min.
No measurement for the figs?
Hi Daren,
This time around I didn’t include a fig measurement because it’s really just a matter of personal taste and totally optional. For this recipe I think I used about 300g of figs!
Thanks- since its fig season now it seems crazy not to include them.