Who Saves Bacon Grease?

get most meat local. fresh. have made candles with it. will do in a pinch. also, lard is great for starting a cold fire. i crumble newspaper, rub it in the can, throw it in. works good, almost as good as my other trick.

I usually use it up pretty fast, but I've had it stay good for months in the fridge.

I suppose you could freeze it and it would stay good for years.

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Who saves bacon grease?

Who doesn't?

Heck I buy bacon and cook it just to get bacon grease!!

I save bacon grease!

How else you going to get wilted lettuce in the summer (well, other than leave it in the sun picked too long)?

We switch off frying potatoes in bacon grease or in butter, depending on the mood and rest of the meal.

Drizzle just a bit over steamed cabbage. Yummmmm.

Use a bit over dog food in the winter for the pups - good for their coats, provides a bit of extra fat and gives them a treat.

Saute the onions lightly in bacon grease for potato soup.

Sooooo many ways to use it! Don't throw it away! Keep it in its own can in the fridge.

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~Falcon

Spreading lanolin love one fleece at a time.
It's a wooly job, but someone's got to do it.

I order the grease keeper that is on Paul's site the other day after he posted in another thread recently. Got it from Amazon and it is a nice cup for storing bacon grease. I'm not real comfortable leaving it out on the counter as we don't use it every day so I'll leave it in the fridge. All these years we have been using extra virgin olive oil for cooking but I'm looking to try something different occasionally. Seems everything is bad for you in one way or another, might as well enjoy good tasting food while on this earth.

Bacon grease also makes a dandy fire starter aid. Smear some on the wood, and it lights much more readily.

Bacon grease??? My dogs used to love it in the winters up north. But now theres only 1 dog. I use the resulting grease. For leather goods. It cleans real nice!!!!

I store my bacon grease in a container and keep it in the freezer. I use some for when I'm frying eggs, and add a little to green beans (gives it a wonderful flavor) mostly. And as others have said, you can use it in making breads, gravy, or pour over pet food to flavor it.

What do you make gravy out of if you do not save grease??????????
I have two cans in the fridge, one for pork grease, and one for beef grease. Can not tell you how long it is good as it does not stay around long.

I save bacon grease, I save any grease really. If I don't use it, I pour it over that cheap cat food I buy for my cats. My Mom used to have one of those metal bacon grease cans with a strainer inside, she kept it on the stove. I don't know what ever happened to it, haven't seen it in years.

So if folks don't know how long bacon grease in the fridge lasts. Can someone tell me how to determine when it is "bad"? Does it grow fuzz on it, smell, color, taste??????????

I wish she was alive to ask...maybe my mother will remember, but when I was growing up in England, my Gran lived with us. She would keep a pot of bacon drippings in a cabinet, not even in the fridge, with a fry basket permanently in it and she'd fry in it regularly.

I seem to remember her using the same pot indefinately and she would filter out the bits of crispy scraps each time before putting it away.

Perhaps the fact that she heated it and used it so often kept it good? She used to fry everything in it and perhaps that's why her food tasted so darned good?

She did it her whole life and lived to be 91..died of problems completely unrelated to cholesterol or a fatty diet, and we never got sick from bad grease

Which reminds me, one of my absolute favourite things to eat growing up was white bread fried in hot bacon fat with eggs on top..mmmmmm

Bacon grease makes delicious refried beans.

I, too, would like to know how you can tell if it's gone bad.

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Our homestead-in-the-making: Palazzo Rospo
Eating the dream

I assume when it starts smelling or tasting funny.

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I've never had it go "bad" kept in the back of the fridge. Finally got to the bottom of the can this spring (for the first time in 8 years), and it was perfectly fine. Keep it covered, though, or it takes on some interesting smells.

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~Falcon

Spreading lanolin love one fleece at a time.
It's a wooly job, but someone's got to do it.

I also save it. When it is no longer hot I pour it in a rubber dish w/ lid and store in fridge. Use it to fry my eggs, on cast iron, and to flavor my green beans.

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"Mama always says stupid is as stupid does" Forrest Gump

"It is discouraging to think how many people are shocked by honesty and how few by deceit." Noel Coward's Blithe Spirits

My grandpa had another use for bacon grease he used it to condition the hooves of the horses and milk cow ( in AZ the hooves got dry and cracked off flakes dont see that too much in MO)

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Whether you think you can or whether you think you can't you are right.... Henry Ford

Enough said, I will save my bacon grease from now on instead of throwing it away. I never thought about it being healthier than margarine but I guess your right. Thanks for all the ideas. I didn't think that I would get 38 of them.

It makes heavenly popcorn too. We never used anything but bacon grease for that. Until the microwave showed up.

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Deja Moo; The feeling I've heard this bull before.