Bacon Ends for the Freezer

While grocery shopping last week I came across an item in the meat department that piqued my interest.  Namely my interest in saving money.  Also my (slightly smaller) interest in bacon.

Not chocolate covered or anything like that.  Just regular bacon.

This was almost regular bacon, except that it was a vacuum pack of "bacon ends and pieces".  It sounds worse than it looks.  And it makes perfect sense.  Sliced bacon is very uniformly shaped, and of course pigs are not so.  So the ends of it get packed and put in the cooler for thrifty people like me to buy at a much lower price.

This is where vegetarians should really click away.

When I cut the pack open, I saw that the pieces varied greatly in size and shape.  There were pieces of sliced bacon, plus large chunks.  Some of the chunks were mostly fat, some of them were all meat.  I was actually a little surprised at how much meat there was in there.

So I came up with an idea to prep the bacon for future use.  I used my kitchen shears to cut the large pieces into manageable sizes, and packed them into muffin pans.  I was a little worried that the bacon, once frozen, would stick to the pan.  For one pan, I used silicone liners.  For the second pan, I lined each cup with my nemesis, plastic wrap.  I need to buy more silicone liners.

I had removed the wrap when I realized this would
be a better post with a picture, so I replaced the
frozen bacon in the pan for their closeup.

I put the pans in the freezer, and once frozen, I removed the (ewww) bacon muffins and popped them in a freezer bag.  Back into the freezer they went, where they await their marriage to onions in the next batch of homemade beans.

Speaking of bacon, if you haven't tried the bacon from the meat counter, you're really missing out.  At least at our Fred Meyer, the bacon is really meaty and not very fatty.  It has a good smoky flavor, too. It's a fairly local brand, Hempler's.  It is not more expensive than the better pre-packaged bacon, but it is higher quality and you can get just the amount you need.

UPDATE:  I used one of these while making beans yesterday, and to my dismay, it's maple-cured bacon.  Bryan is happy about that, but I am not a fan.  I guess this is still a good idea if you like maple cured bacon. :)