It's one of the straight-sided ones with a glass dome lid. I throw a whole pound of frozen bacon in with the temperature fairly low. The fat starts to render out while the rest is still frozen so it doesn't stick too badly. Keep checking until you see the strips starting to separate on top. Use tongs to pull it all apart and spread it around.

This is actually the start to one of my favorite dishes, and using something that the bacon sticks to the pan a bit is a bonus. When the bacon is done and you pull it out, pour out and reserve most of the fat. Leave in enough to saute one diced medium union. Saute until clear. Add 1/4-cup white wine to the pan to deglaze. Add one can diced tomatoes. Heat through.

While you're doing this the pasta should be cooking. (Don't you love recipes that say halfway through, "Now get the other ingredient you've already prepared"?) After draining the pasta, add about 1/4-cup of the bacon fat and toss. Plate the pasta, add the bacon back to the tomato/onion mix and pour over the pasta. Serve with crusty bread.



But other than that, I don't really fry in it. I use it for heating pre-made sauces, because the large surface area warms them up faster without burning. It's also handy for tossing the pasta in with the sauce. I can't do that in small sauce pans.

Like the one about soaking the beans? Funny for us, probably not so much for him.

Go to that handy little "Site Search" link above and to the right. Select user "Andrew Grygus" and put in the word "bean". It's the [link|http://z.iwethey.org/forums/render/content/show?contentid=174907|third link].


Oh, and I'm up because I slept about 15 hours last night. It'll be the rest of the week trying to get my internal clock re-set.