BLT Lite?

August 26, 2006 3:02 PM

BLTfilter: If I cook up a package of bacon there is a ton of grease left in the pan. Are the calories in the grease included in the nutrition information?

The package says it contains 800 calories without any "as packaged" or "as prepared" notation. I'm guessing there's ~50 grams of grease left behind. Can I multiply that by 9 (calories per gram of fat) and subtract it from the 800 calories for a better representation of what we're actually eating?

posted by jaysus chris to food & drink (21 comments total)

The calories listed for the bacon are for prepared bacon; it accounts for the lost grease. (Bacon, uncooked, is about 125 calories a raw slice. Bacon, cooked, is about 50 calories a slice.)

And in case you were curious, for a BLT made with two slices of white bread, two slices of bacon, and half a tablespoon of Miracle Whip, is 232 calories. Yum!
posted by headspace at 3:12 PM on August 26, 2006 [1 favorite]

According the the USDA. You do the math.
posted by trevyn at 3:16 PM on August 26, 2006

If you're looking at making lower calorie BLTs, Alton Brown pointed out on his show that a good BLT is really all about the tomatoes. You can get by with little bacon, because it goes a long way. The tomatoes, on the other hand, are critical, and in my opinion, if you don't have good tomatoes, you would be better off just skipping the sandwich.

(On the other hand, if you want a higher calorie sandwich, try my personal invention, the "kung pao" sandwich: bacon, peanut butter, and sriracha sauce.)
posted by IvyMike at 3:39 PM on August 26, 2006 [2 favorites]

Wow. The difference between cooked bacon and raw bacon is even larger than I thought. The National Heart Association might want to start a "Crispy bacon: It will kill you more slowly" campaign. Thanks!
posted by jaysus chris at 4:05 PM on August 26, 2006

IvyMike, I made a BKP (Bacon Kung Pao) with some of the leftover bacon. It was bizzarely tasty.
posted by jaysus chris at 5:18 PM on August 26, 2006

f you don't have good tomatoes, you would be better off just skipping the sandwich.

Often mediocre tomatos can be vastly improved by marinating them with fresh chiffonaded basil for an hour or more.

But then you wind up with a BBLT (bacon, basil, lettuce & tomato) or just a BBT. Add in the calories for the olive oil and subtract those for the mayo.
posted by MonkeySaltedNuts at 5:50 PM on August 26, 2006

To additionally decrease the calorie count use back (canadian) bacon at 185cal/100g instead of 541 for belly bacon (cooked values). To additionally increase the calorie count, make bacon fat mayonnaise.
posted by arruns at 6:05 PM on August 26, 2006 [2 favorites]

I know this thread is about the calorie content of the bacon, but since IvyMike repeated Alton Brown regarding the tomatoes, I must repsectfully disagree and say that the BLT is really about the Mayo and Bacon. A bacon, lettuce and Mayo sandwich is as good (if not better) than a BLT with anything less than an heirloom tomato.
posted by JohnnyGunn at 8:12 PM on August 26, 2006

I'll go one step further than JohnnyGunn and say that the one way to compensate for the possible inferiority of any one component of the BLT is to add more elements, decreasing the criticality of any one element's quality.

Thus I give you the BELTCh sandwich -- bacon, egg, lettuce, tomato, and cheese. So much fat you could put in a drawing of a tomato instead of a real one and you would enjoy it just as much.
posted by stupidsexyFlanders at 8:28 PM on August 26, 2006

I respectfully disagree, JohnnyGunn. Please leave out the "silent M". If I wanted mayonnaise, I would've asked for an MBLT. And the tomato is crucial.
posted by qvtqht at 3:48 AM on August 27, 2006

Not to threadjack, but are there calorie counts on these various sandwiches? I once wrote an article about a modified BLT as referenced in a movie (it was a Thomas Keller recipe), and although the sandwich was endlessly enjoyable, I declined to make them continually as they were supposedly 1200 calories apiece. Some of the info in this thread is not consistent with that, however, so maybe BLT sandwiches are not as bad as I thought they were?

(ingredients if you're curious: 3 bacon slices, 2 monterey jack slices, one egg, mayo, bread, lettuce, tomato, and a teaspoon of butter. I'm sure the butter greatly adds to the count, but it can be substituted with cooking spray)
posted by brianvan at 9:30 AM on August 27, 2006

I thought mayo was integral to the classic BLT! I've never seen a standard BLT that didn't include the M. I think what you're looking for, qvtight, is a "BLT, hold the mayo".

And, if you're looking for a supreme taste sensation, try the BLORT - a BLT with onion rings!

By the way, this is officially the Summer Of Bacon. Evidence: the invention of the Bacon Mary! (A Bloody Mary with a crisp strip of bacon in place of the celery swizzle.)
posted by Aquaman at 10:45 AM on August 27, 2006 [1 favorite]

I know of a bar that serves a bacon martini...
posted by brianvan at 3:08 PM on August 27, 2006

You gotta have mayo and mustard or forget the whole thing. And yes, crispy (not burnt) bacon is key, not the tomato. Lettuce is always optional. Avocado is a nice addition (BATS!).

If you want to go for more calories you make it into a grilled (frying the bread in butter) cheese sandwich only you add bacon (natch), grilled onions and mustard. I don't want to know how many calories it has.
posted by deborah at 4:45 PM on August 27, 2006

I wouldn't call it 'key', but mayo is certainly necessary. And it has to be Hellmann's, or "Best Foods" (as it's inexplicably labelled here in Arizona). Miracle Whip comes from the devil's testicles.

Don't forget the black pepper.
posted by rifflesby at 6:18 PM on August 27, 2006

Aquaman - I have to agree with you. Onion rings are the perfect counterbalance to seared ahi in a sandwich.
posted by porpoise at 10:08 PM on August 27, 2006

There are other kinds of mayo that are good, but miracle whip isn't mayo. It's... something else.

It's not even advertised as being mayo - it calls itself salad dressing.
posted by flaterik at 12:34 AM on August 28, 2006

I rarely use mayo. (I only find it essential for the occasional batch of coleslaw)

Most commercial mayo is made from soybean oil which to me tastes unpleasant. I could make my own from a better oil, but since we don't use much, most of a batch would be wasted (I'm leary about keeping something made from raw eggs long in the refridgerator).

I've heard that Hain makes a safflower mayo. Does this tast good enough to track down and will it last in the fridge?

I've found some canolla mayos but I find canolla to have "fishy" overtones. Where oh where are "designer" mayos? - made from the oils of corn, peanut, walnut, avocato, goose, sunflower, pecan, etc?
posted by MonkeySaltedNuts at 1:10 AM on August 28, 2006

Mmmm. I had bacon ice cream this summer. Salty, sweet, creamy...a little scoop of tastiness.
posted by grateful at 8:09 AM on August 28, 2006

brianvan- my BLT is 232 going by Nutrition Facts and Calorie Count* . 2 slices of white bread, 120 calories, 2 small slices of bacon, 72, 1 tbsp Miracle Whip, 40 calories. (I don't count the less than .5 calories in two lettuce leaves, or the 4 calories in a 1/4 inch thick tomato slice.) Toast in the toaster, fry bacon and drain, and assemble. Pure bacony goodness.

Your Monterey Jack BLT would be about 457, breaking down like this: 3 small bacon slices 103, 2 monterey jack slices 140, one egg 92, mayo 57 (1 tbsp), bread 120 (white) , lettuce 0, tomato 4, and a teaspoon of butter 34. So hardly low-cal, but nowhere approaching 1200 calories (unless you're using thick, gigantic slices of bread and a cup of mayo on each slice.)
posted by headspace at 5:22 AM on August 29, 2006

* I don't work for them; I've just used them throughought my diet, and lost 35 pounds since May, so I think they're pretty accurate.
posted by headspace at 5:23 AM on August 29, 2006