- Hey, everyone, it's Barry here,
welcome to My Virgin Kitchen, I hope you are well.
Today, two worlds collide.
A few of you have sent me a recipe
for carrot bacon, and it's not
bacon wrapped in carrots, or the other way around,
carrots wrapped in bacon, which might be all right.
Now, this is carrot "bacon",
so it's one for the veggie/vegans
of you amongst us, and I know there'd
be a lot of people goin', "That's not real bacon,"
but a lot of you wanted to see it,
so we're gonna give it a go, it seems
pretty quirky indeed, if you want,
I have the full method, ingredients,
bits and bobs, it's on the website,
if you're not there already, so let's crack on
and give it a go, I'm intrigued,
almost as intrigued as Boston is right there.
Boston is just, like, pondering. (chuckles)
First thing you need is a baking tray,
and you can either line it with some baking
parchment or grab one of these SilPat things.
Like, a silicone mat.
They are amazing, I can't believe I never
had one of these before, mine was a little bit
bigger and I trimmed it, so you can get these
online everywhere, I kinda feel like I need
a My Virgin Kitchen one, yeah.
(singing) Look, it's a carrot
that I have washed.
What we're gonna do, this is gonna be our bacon,
okay, we're gonna just take the head off,
like so, just leave it right there,
nice little hairstyle.
Take off the bottom.
And then, to actually peel it,
we're gonna use one of those Y peelers,
and that will also give us the strips as well
of the bacon, okay, this will make sense
in about two seconds.
Peeler, like that, okay?
So let's just get that outer skin off.
All right, so I got all me bits of carrot there,
like so, this can just stay there.
So, what I'm gonna do, this is quite a nice
sort of flat-ish shape, and by peeling it
using this it gives it a nice thin slice,
you can see how thin that is,
that is gonna be the perfect size and shape,
apparently, for the bacon, so we take the peeler,
and we just go down,
and there we go, one (chuckles)
rasher of carrot.
So I'll just keep doin' that.
Aw, that's a good one, I like that.
It is actually quite important to try and get
as thick and even down as you can, if you cut
at a slight angle, it'll give it, like, the first one there?
Yeah, so there is a little bit of skill.
There we go, a big old pile of carrot bacon,
it does actually look quite cool,
kinda like a warped shoe horn.
So you should be left with nice carrot strips
and what is left, kinda, if you don't use it all,
it could be a nice door stop, imagine goin'
round someone's house and they've got
a carrot for a door stop, it could happen,
it could be the future, but (chuckles)...
I don't know what that was.
What's gonna happen now is we are gonna put
the marinade together in this bowl that the carrot
is gonna be in, and it's gonna sit in it for
a little while and try and become bacon-y.
The marinade begins, first up,
we go in with a tablespoon of rapeseed oil.
(makes noise)
A tablespoon (makes noise), sorry, that's not
the most appealin' noise right now,
of, I didn't think I was recordin' then,
phew, this is tahini, okay?
This is basically ground sesame seeds, it's used in hummus.
A tablespoon of maple syrup, oh yeah!
Tablespoon of soy sauce.
For this one you could use liquid smoke,
and if you watch our vlog you would know that
I went out to a supermarket that's supposed to sell
it last night, they didn't have it, so a good
alternative is actually a smoked powder,
so obviously smoked paprika,
I love paprika, is what we're goin' for,
so about a heap to teaspoon of that.
All right, in that goes.
I think the smoked paprika's really added that,
it is gettin' a smoky vibe right now,
so you're gonna get the sweetness and the
caramelization with the maple syrup, the tahini,
and the oil's gonna sorta heat and thicken it up
and make it all sort of caramelised along with
the syrup and the salt, the salt?
The soy sauce will give it a bit of a saltiness,
so let's give it a mix.
Show you that, like that, oh my gosh.
Big, messy thing, look at that.
That does smell quite bacon-y, I'll go with it.
A couple of you were ravin' about this recipe,
so I'll keep going.
So, here's what's gonna happen.
(chuckles) We've got our strips of carrot,
and I've jolly picked out my favourite
eight decent cuts that I've done out of those,
some of 'em were a little bit pants, if I'm honest.
Get 'em in there.
Just gently mix it around.
Make sure all of those strips are fully coated
in this marinade, in fact, we probably got enough
to submerge it right in there, that's quite good,
if we can get it to sit right in there.
Oh, wow.
Like a hot tub of confused carrot flavour.
What I'm gonna do,
just cling film it up.
You know how good I am with cling film.
(chuckles) Right, so we'll put this
in the fridge (makes noise) to marinate
for about half an hour.
Probably one of the weirdest things I've ever
put in the fridge, but we'll just go with it,
all right, we'll just go with it.
All right, so it's just about to finish off in the fridge,
the only thing I've really done in the meantime,
other than do some social media stuff,
Snapchat, Instagram stories, if you're not followin'
@myvirginkitchen, I've decided to change me
SilPat thing to baking parchment,
'cause I just feel like that could be a cool look
with the orange against the white, maybe.
So that's it, as long as it's nonslip, either way is good.
Oh, that does smell good, I like that.
It's really addictive, that on its own,
without the carrot in there.
You could eat that, well, not on its own,
you could have it as a drink.
Okay, carry on.
But all we'll do is take a rasher of bacon out,
like this, oh yeah.
I actually called it bacon.
I'm falling for this.
And just lay it all along there.
All right, so they've all fitted on there,
they're nice and stained.
I hope you'll agree that is lookin' a lot more bacon-y.
And what we'll do, we have got a fair bit
of this left, but we'll just give it each
an extra sort of brush in this chilled marinade,
it is really cold, but I'm excited to see
what this is gonna do.
Nice.
So I've pre-heated my oven to 200 degrees Centigrade,
and that is where these are goin' right now.
So, in that goes.
And we'll see it in a jiffy.
So it's in the oven right now, and I'm thinkin' two things:
One, I'm really excited to see what this tastes like,
it might not taste like bacon, but I think
it will still be good, second of all,
I'm finding the filming today a little bit tricky.
I've been doin' some cameraperson, female and male
interviews at the new studio, and it's just,
I get to use both my arms, I don't have to worry
about the camera anymore!
I found it really cool, so that will be coming
as soon as I've done my interviewing process.
Found some really cool people,
and it's gonna be a lot of fun.
Bacon!
Fake bacon!
Tell you what, folks, it's only been 15 minutes
and it's done, the smell in here is smellin'
really smoky, like bacon, let's get it out.
All right, let's do it.
Check that out.
You see that?
That's crazy.
I mean, it is crazy, but...
It looks pretty good.
So here's what we'll do, we'll taste it on its own,
and then I'll make a bacon sandwich as well,
'cause I really wanna see if the mental thing,
particularly if there's any veggies or vegans
watching that wanna try this, if it's similar.
Why not?
So it's actually still quite soft.
If I baked it a little longer, the caramelization
would've probably firmed that up a little bit more,
but to me, I think it might have tasted a bit
too much burnt, so let's give this a go.
The first thing I'm gonna do is actually put it into
my favourite thing ever, which is like a bacon sandwich.
So I'm gonna put maybe four rashers in there.
Bit of brown sauce on it, because that's the way
I like my bacon sandwich.
And then we'll try one on its own.
So I'm gonna just see if this works.
Hmm, I really fancy a bacon sandwich for breakfast.
Oh, cool!
It does look like a bacon sandwich.
Not really, guys.
Does taste good, though.
Can't quite work it out in this.
So let's get our strip on, here it is,
so yeah, a little bit wobbly.
(moaning and humming)
I think, mentally, in my head, I'm tryin' to want it
to taste and feel more like bacon than it actually is.
You get the smokiness, you get a teeny bit
of salty tang, I think next time maybe I would lower
the amount of maple syrup in there,
it's really, it's really sweet, if I'm honest,
but texturewise, it does kinda work.
So it's not a bad alternative, I'm gonna have another piece.
You know, it's a bit floppy, like that.
There's somethin' about it.
I feel like I could play around with this and actually
make it something much more closer,
maybe the ratios need to be mixed up a bit more.
But, you know what, ultimately,
it's actually quite a fun thing, and it's so quick to make,
so now that I've done it, it's your turn.
I hope you do give it a try, if you do, send me a picture
@myvirginkitchen, maybe tweak the ingredients
a little bit, maybe take a teeny bit of maple syrup out
and let me know what you think, I would love to know
your thoughts, remember to subscribe for regular recipes
and food fun, and yeah, bacon me up.
See you next time.