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After buying a faux fancy oil and vinegar caddy, I decided it was time to finally make some bacon infused vinegar. To do this I fried three strip of bacon over medium low heat and turned them frequently to get them nice and flat. Figuring the vinegar would be able to absorb as much flavor as possible while the bacon was still warm, as soon as they were done I patted them dry on some paper towels and rolled them up and stuffed them inside the vinegar bottle. I then added enough distilled white vinegar to cover the bacon and stoppered the bottle. Interestingly, the bacon I put in the bottle was cooked about the way I like to eat it: crispy, but not burned, so it had a deep, rich red-brown color. However, after only a half hour in the bottle with the vinegar it had paled visible and started to look slightly undercooked. 
The finished productAfter a week of infusing the vinegar is pleasantly smokey and meaty. The bacon flavor is understated, so increasing the ratio of bacon to vinegar would be a good ajustment. It may be good to use a process similar to pickling where the cooked bacon is boiled briefly in the vinegar. This would help speed up the extraction of the bacon flavor as well as make it it safer to store on the shelf for a while to steep. As a side effect, this would also produce pickled bacon, yum! (However, unless you use salted bacon, you'd probably end up with very bland bacon strips.) So what can one do with bacon infused vinegar anyhow you ask? Lots of things! I happen to love vinegar, so it's a common addition to a wide variety of things coming out of my kitchen. But if you're a little more restrained in your vinegar use, it would be a great addition to some cooked turnip greens (they're good cooked with a little salt pork anyways), as part of a vinaigrette (it would be perfect paired with bacon infused olive oil), or how about a couple tablespoons of balsamic bacon vinegar sprinkled over some ripe summer strawberries or tomatoes? It could also be used in bruschetta, as the base of a beurre blanc, or a condiment for fish and chips. | |||
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