Today’s cooking project from my recipe collection was bacon-wrapped chicken pieces, something I originally started making a couple of years ago for their value as an easy enough to make last minute hors d’oeuvres contribution for a party; now I principally make them for the value of having them pre-made in the freezer, including to possibly use at a later time as hors d’oeuvres at a party.
To begin, parchment paper was placed in a baking pan:
Wooden toothpicks were also taken out:
I cut a package and a half’s worth (375g each package, for a total of about 560g) of bacon into half-lengths, which worked out to 40 half-slices, the amount of pieces I target in my recipe.
The rest of the bacon was placed in a bag and frozen, for later use.
Two chicken breasts were placed on a cutting board:
The chicken breasts were sliced along their length …
… and then each chicken breast was cut into approximately 20 cubes:
In this case, the pile on the left are the cubes to be used directly, while the pile on the right are smaller pieces which were bundled together two or three pieces at a time in half-slices of bacon as though they were full pieces of chicken.
The cubes were individually wrapped in a half-slice of bacon, and skewered with a wooden toothpick:
Smaller pieces of chicken were bundled together, two or three pieces at a time, and wrapped in bacon, then skewered with a wooden toothpick:
As each piece of bacon was wrapped in bacon and skewered, they were placed on the parchment paper in a baking pan:
Once all the pieces of chicken were wrapped, they were equally divided between two baking pans that fit (one tray at a time) in my countertop convection oven:
The first tray was placed in my countertop convection oven (and yes, the glass door was dirty, and was cleaned afterwards):
Partway through the cooking (after about 25 minutes), the pieces were turned over (in this case, the three columns on the left):
When the pieces were fully cooked after about 50 minutes, they were taken out of the oven:
Cooked pieces were transferred to a clean tray to be placed in the freezer:
The first tray of cooked bacon-wrapped chicken was placed in the freezer to cool and freeze.
Meanwhile, the grease and drippings in the baking pan …
… were drained into a bowl, cooled and solidified, and then wrapped in paper, to be placed in the municipal brown box for composting.
The second tray’s worth of raw bacon-wrapped chicken pieces was transferred to the first baking pan, because of its deep sides and all the grease and drippings produced:
The pieces of bacon-wrapped chicken were cooked the same way as the first tray, and once taken out of the drippings, looked like the first tray of cooked pieces:
After the second tray of bacon-wrapped chicken had cooked, the frozen pieces from the first tray were transferred to a plastic container:
Those from the second tray, once cooked, were also transferred to a separate tray, frozen, and then transferred to a plastic container.
All the bacon-wrapped chicken pieces are now in the freezer again, waiting to be eaten — some of them tomorrow!
Of course, the pieces were tasty (I tasted one to make sure they were good!)