Cooking bacon on a smoker is one of the best ways to enjoy perfectly crispy, smoky bacon. Smoking bacon infuses it with delicious woody flavors that you just can’t get from pan frying or baking it in the oven.
In this comprehensive guide, we’ll cover everything you need to know to make incredible smoked bacon at home, including:
- The benefits of smoking bacon
- Choosing the right type of bacon
- How to prepare the bacon
- Using the proper smoking technique
- Cooking times and temperatures
- Smoker and fuel recommendations
- Serving suggestions and recipe ideas
Why Smoke Your Bacon?
There are several advantages to smoking bacon rather than cooking it through traditional methods
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Enhanced flavor – Smoking infuses the bacon with smoky, woody depth you can’t achieve otherwise. It takes bacon from great to phenomenal.
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Less splattering – Because you cook it indirectly, there’s less messy splattering grease.
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No lingering smell – Unlike frying, smoking doesn’t leave your kitchen smelling like bacon for hours. The aroma stays outside where it belongs.
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Versatility – Smoked bacon works great as a stand alone breakfast food but also as a flavor-boosting addition to burgers sandwiches, salads and more.
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Fun technique – It’s an easy, novel way to get more use out of your smoker and level up your grilling skills
Choosing the Right Bacon
For the best results, opt for a thick-cut artisanal bacon over regular thin-sliced grocery store bacon. The extra thickness allows the smoke flavor to penetrate fully and gives you the best texture.
Good bacon options include:
- Thick-cut applewood smoked
- Peppered
- Maple-flavored
- Cherrywood smoked
The bacon should have good marbling of fat throughout. Avoid bacon labeled “lean”. You want plenty of tasty fat to keep it moist during the smoking process.
Buy quality bacon from your local butcher shop, warehouse club or artisanal bacon company for superior results.
Preparing the Bacon
Properly preparing the bacon helps ensure it smokes evenly:
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Start with cold bacon straight from the fridge. Cold bacon smokes best.
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Prepare a drip pan – Place a disposable foil pan or other drip pan under the bacon to catch the rendered fat. This prevents flare-ups.
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Use a cooling rack – Set the bacon on a wire cooling rack placed inside the foil pan. This allows smoke and heat circulation.
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Separate the slices – Make sure the bacon isn’t touching itself or the rack. Lay it out in a single layer.
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Apply seasoning (optional) – For additional flavor, sprinkle seasoning or rubs onto the bacon before smoking. Try brown sugar, maple syrup or barbecue dry rub.
Smoking Your Bacon
Smoking bacon on a pellet grill or electric smoker is easier than charcoal or wood-burning offsets. The key is using a low, indirect heat:
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Temperature – 225 to 275°F is ideal. The lower temp gives you more time to infuse flavor.
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Wood – Use fruit woods like apple, cherry or pecan for the best flavor. Stay away from heavy mesquite smoke.
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Time – Expect 1 to 1.5 hours for fully cooked bacon at 225°F. Cook times vary based on thickness.
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Doneness – Cook until it reaches your desired level of crispiness. Use tongs to test along the way.
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Rest – After smoking, let the bacon rest for 5 minutes before serving. The cool down helps further crisp it up.
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Safety – Always cook bacon to a safe internal temperature of at least 145°F. Use a meat thermometer to verify doneness if needed.
Serving Smoked Bacon
Enjoy your smoked bacon in all the usual ways, like in breakfast sandwiches, on burgers and in BLTs. Or try these tasty serving suggestions:
- Crumble it over baked potatoes, soups or salads
- Chop it into lardons and add to carbonara, paella or fried rice
- Use in place of pancetta in pasta dishes
- Wrap it around smoked sausage
- Make candied bacon for sweet and salty appeal
- Toss crumbled bits into cornbread batter before baking
For future meals, smoked bacon stores well in the fridge for 5-7 days. Freeze extras for longer storage.
Smoked Bacon Recipes to Try
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Smoked Bacon-Wrapped Jalapeño Poppers – Spicy, cheesy and bacon – a perfect combo!
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Maple Bacon Breakfast Casserole – Smoky bacon pairs beautifully with maple syrup.
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Smoked Bacon Cheeseburger – A gourmet burger made special with double smoked bacon.
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BLT Salad – All the taste of a BLT in healthier salad form.
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Smoked Bacon Split Pea Soup – Hearty, cozy and full of flavor.
Make Perfect Smoked Bacon at Home
My title is Homemaker. So ridiculous.
We love bacon over here. Even though everyone in our family loves bacon, Traeger Smoked Bacon is our favorite.
We’ve had our Traeger for a couple years now, and we absolutely love it. This isn’t a paid advertisement for Traeger; it’s just my honest opinion about a product that is simple and useful. Food can be baked, grilled, braised, or smoked on a wood-fired grill, and it can cook food quickly or slowly. It can also smoke food.
You can learn more about Traeger Pellet Smokers on their Amazon page, and see if you need to add one to your birthday wish list. (affiliate link)
The ingredients list for this recipe has one thing on it. Bacon. The end. And the instructions aren’t complicated, either.
How to Cook Bacon on a Smoker
Preheat Traeger to 325 degrees.
When preheated, place bacon slices directly on grill grate and close lid. Our Traeger pellet grill holds a fairly tight two pounds of Kirkland bacon from Costco, which is our bacon of choice.
If your bacon isn’t too thick and your smoker cooks evenly, no turning is necessary. But if your pellet grill has hot spots, you may need to turn some slices over or some will be done before everybody else.
You’ll need to keep an eye on it the last ten minutes or so.
When bacon is to desired crispiness, remove from grill and enjoy!
I love that cooking bacon outside keeps my house from smelling like a diner all day. My husband doesn’t get it. He thinks its great when the house smells like greasy bacon.
We don’t like taking our Traeger camping or tailgating because it’s too big. If we want to bring our Trager Smoked Bacon with us, we make a bunch of it, put it in a Ziploc bag, and go.
Even though Traeger Smoked Bacon tastes great on burgers, pellet smoker bacon is also a great addition to camping breakfasts because you don’t have to clean up bacon grease.
Traeger Smoked Bacon is easy to make and tastes great! If you have a pellet grill, you must try this simple pellet smoker bacon recipe!
- 1 to 2 pounds bacon slices
- Preheat Traeger to 325.
- When the grill is hot, put the bacon slices directly on the grate and shut the lid.
- You might need to flip the bacon over about halfway through cooking, depending on how thick it is and where the hot spots are in your pellet cooker. If your smoker cooks evenly and your bacon is thinner, you don’t need to turn it.
- Once you’re happy with how crispy the bacon is, take it off the grill and enjoy!
We use a pellet blend of maple, hickory, and cherry, but your favorite wood pellets will be fine.
For more smoke flavor, cook at a lower temperature for longer.
Easy PERFECT Smoked Bacon – How to Cook the BEST Bacon!
How do you cook smoked bacon?
Spray with a non-stick spray so that the bacon doesn’t stick once applied. Smoked Bacon – Place the bacon directly on the grate and cook for 30 minutes. Make certain that you keep on eye on it near the end as you don’t want to miss the mark and overcook it! Crispy bacon is good but burnt bacon is not.
Can you smoke Bacon on a smoker?
Smoked bacon slices are a fast smoker recipe and great for breakfast or as a topping for smoked burgers. Let’s make it… It’s going to be difficult to go back to oven baked bacon once you’ve tried this homemade bacon on the smoker recipe. HEY THERE — Are you on instagram? I post quick, easy smoker recipes there @sipbitego.
How long do you cook bacon in a pellet smoker?
Instead of higher heat, set your pellet smoker to 275ºF with the smoke setting on high. From there, place your bacon directly on the grill grates. Shut the lid and let your cooker do it’s thing. At 275ºF, plan on your thick cut bacon taking around 30-35 minutes before it reaches a nice crispiness.
What type of bacon to smoke?
Bacon – We have found that a thick cut of bacon is the best type of bacon to smoke. Yes, this is literally all you need for this recipe! One simple ingredient! (Just make certain that you choose thick cut bacon for this recipe!) Preheat Smoker – Start by preheating your smoker to 300 degrees.
How do you smoke a bacon belly?
Soak the belly in the brine in the refrigerator for a week to ensure that it is fully cured. Once the curing process is complete, it’s time to smoke the bacon. You can either cold smoke the belly at a low temperature (80°F – 100°F) or hot smoke it at a higher temperature (220°F).
How do I know if my Bacon is done smoking?
Check the temperature inside the smoker with a meat thermometer. The bacon is done when it reaches an internal temperature of 150-155 degrees Fahrenheit. Add more wood chips to the coals as needed to maintain a consistent flow of smoke.