Bringing home the (fake) bacon

Our search for the perfect partner for summer’s favorite sandwich

Summer isn’t officially over until I’ve stained my favorite white tee with tomato juice dripping from a fresh BLT. Not complaining: It’s worth it for what I’d consider a perfect sandwich. A proper BLT strikes a delicate balance of salt, acid, and fat. It’s creamy, yet crisp and fresh, and a little greasy. Even though it’s really all about the tomato, this sando is nothing without the chewy, yet crunchy, bacon.

Bacon’s mix of flavors and textures is a full-on sensory experience that’s hard to match. A rapidly growing number of plant-based products are attempting to replicate it, and there’s a whole corner of the herbivorous internet devoted to making substitutes out of everyday vegetables. Can any of these wannabes hope to deliver a satisfying swap for the porky goodness in my beloved BLTs? Let’s get frying. 

Part I: The readymade fake bacon fry-down

Supermarket shelves have been stocked with meatless bacon for decades. Newer varieties tap everything from coconut to seaweed to replicate pork’s signature umami-rich crunch. Still, the mainstays made mostly from soy and wheat are by far the easiest to come by in the Average American Grocery Store. How do these versions hold up to the crown jewel of pork products? I fried up four popular un-bacons and rated them on a scale of 0-5 🐷s, with five piggies being a perfect swap for the real deal. The criteria:

• Appearance. Comes in long strips and mimics bacon’s pinkish-reddish hue.

• Texture. Achieves a complex mix of chewy middles and crispy edges.

• Taste. Balances umami, salt, and smoke—with a hint of sweetness and grease.

Now, on to the stove!

The contenders, all of which can be found easily at most supermarkets. Credit: Corinne Iozzio

MorningStar Farms Veggie Bacon Strips

This vegetarian bacon is made from soy flour and wheat gluten bound together with egg whites. Cooking in a skillet (the box’s recommendation) takes 8 to 10 minutes, the longest of all the products I tested. With packaging that says, “Wake up and smell the veggie protein!” I was expecting a bit more protein per serving: Two strips contain 2 grams (the equivalent amount of bacon has 5.2) but are significantly less fatty and salty than the OG.

Appearance. These initially turned me off because of their classic “fake meat” look. The strips are marbled with white and brown in a way that tries very hard to emulate bacon’s signature fatty veins. In reality, it just looks like a cartoon. 

Texture. The brown parts actually get crispier than the lighter parts, which remain slightly chewy, kinda like bacon. My strips took only 8 minutes to get crisp, and got even more so as they cooled—just like thin-cut pork belly. They also, in true bacon fashion, go from undercooked to burnt in seconds. 

Taste. These taste surprisingly similar to bacon, with the right amount of salt and smoke. All I was missing was a little greasiness. The instructions didn’t say to use oil when frying, but next time I will in order to dial up the fat factor.

Rating: 🐷🐷🐷🐷

LightLife Smart Bacon

Often sitting in the middle of the pack in online f-acon rankings, this mimic is made from soy protein and wheat gluten. A pair of slices clocks in at 5 grams of protein, which is close to the real thing, but has more sodium per serving. The strips can be cooked in an oiled skillet (what I did) in 3 to 3 ½ minutes or baked in the oven or toaster oven. 

Appearance. These slabs were wider and stouter than your usual strip of pork, and had no fake fat marbling, which makes them look kind of like turkey bacon.

Texture. Out of the box, the strips are brittle and crumbled a bit when I separated them. Once they were cooked, I found them floppy and only slightly crispy on the edges, despite getting fried in oil. I thought cooking longer would make them crunchier, but they just got tougher and dried out.

Taste. These were salty with nothing much else going on, and they definitely lacked the smokiness of bacon. They tasted more like a processed meat like bologna, with an aftertaste of soy that is common in imitation animal proteins. 

Rating: 🐷

Upton’s Naturals Seitan Bacon

The only seitan—aka “wheat meat”—bacon of the bunch is flavored with soy sauce and hickory smoke concentrate. A 2-ounce serving (about four pieces) has 15 grams (!) of protein and 17% of your daily salt intake. I cooked these up in a skillet with a bit of oil for a few minutes, per the package instructions. 

Appearance. Similar to the LightLife brand, this f-acon comes in short, rectangular strips that look more like turkey bacon than the piggy kind. 

Texture. If you’re familiar with the texture of seitan, it’s exactly what you would expect: spongy, chewy, with only a slight crisp. I accidentally overcooked my last piece by a minute or two, and it got super crunchy (this was the best one).

Taste. Soy sauce and the addition of the hickory add a hit of umami that makes these taste vaguely on-point. Given the sodium content, they surprisingly need more seasoning (mainly salt) to really convince me. 

Rating: 🐷🐷🐷

Sweet Earth Hickory and Sage Benevolent Bacon

Of all the faux bacon I ate, this one had the most unique ingredients list: vital wheat gluten, adzuki beans, buckwheat groats, hickory flavor, smoked paprika, maple syrup, and nutritional yeast. Two slices contain a respectable 8 grams of protein, and about the same salt total as the USDA’s baseline for the real thing. 

Appearance. The strips come vacuum-sealed in a package of marinade and have noticeable flecks of spice on them. Even before you cook them, they look and smell very flavorful. They’re also a bit thicker than the other contenders. 

Texture. The strips are very fragile, and I was worried they would totally disintegrate in the pan, but they did not. I cooked them in oil for 2 minutes per side, as instructed, but they were still too soft. An extra couple of minutes really crisped them up. 

Taste. I actually loved how these tasted, but they didn’t remind me of bacon. They were sweeter and more like BBQ which, combined with their softness, makes them more like a fake brisket. With so many flavor-packed ingredients, they had little to no fake meat aftertaste. 

Rating: 🐷🐷🐷

The Results:

Clockwise from left: MorningStar Farms, LightLife, Sweet Earth, Upton’s Naturals. Credit: Corinne Iozzio

While I was initially put off by the fake marbling, I couldn’t stop myself from snacking on strip after strip of the MorningStar bacon while testing the others. It’s supremely crispy, and it might fool you into thinking real bacon’s sizzlin’ in the other room based on the smell alone. The only thing I found myself missing was a little bit of greasiness, but overall, it had the closest flavor to the OG: an ideal ready-made partner for an FLT. But what if I told you you probably already have what you need to make an even simpler version at home? Follow me to the crisper drawer, please…

Part II: A near-perfect quickie DIY bacon