In commercials and when I go to restaurants (even fast food!) the bacon that I get is a reddish brown color and seems to be mostly meat, or at least meat textured. However, when I buy bacon at the grocery store, it's inevitably almost all fat. It curls badly when cooked, creates a ton of grease, and never looks anything like what "professional" bacon does.
I've tried thin sliced, thick sliced, apple wood smoked, etc. , etc. and I always seem to have the same problem. I try to look through the packages and I can never find anything that has mostly meat (lots of white fat). Even when I find a pack that looks good, it seems like the few slices I can see are meaty, but the rest are again mostly fatty.
So, what is the secret? Where do restaurants get their perfect bacon? Do I need to ask the grocery meet department for a secret stash of pro bacon? Do I need to go out of my way to a special shop? Is there a name for what I'm looking for other than "bacon"?
I'm in the US, Texas. I know other countries have different ideas of what "bacon" is (right?).
Best Answer
In the UK there are two main cuts of bacon.
There's "streaky bacon", which is cut from the pork belly. This is mostly what you get in the US.
There's also "back bacon" which is cut from the pork loin. This is generally more popular and is very much leaner than streaky bacon. In the US you call it "Canadian bacon".
You can also get "middle bacon" which is cut from both, i.e. a contiguous cut from belly to loin - a piece of streaky bacon and back bacon combined.