Product Review -Jennie-O Turkey Bacon

Jennie-O Turkey bacon is a product which is new to my local grocery store. Since I've been trying to get my family to eat healthier, I thought I would give this new product a try.

From the descriptions on the package, I thought this would be a great addition to our family's grocery list. After all, each strip of bacon contains only 35 calories and 2 grams of fat. And, with a price of only $2.29 for a 12 ounce package, this was about 20 cents less than the low-sodium version of regular pork bacon.

At first glance, the strips of bacon looked odd. They were darker than regular pork bacon and didn't have the fatty parts like you're used to seeing in pork bacon. It also seemed like there were more slices of turkey bacon in the 12 oz package than you would find in a 16 oz package of pork bacon.

It seemed to take quite a while to cook the turkey bacon, however. I believe the package recommended a cook time of about 6 minutes. But, after 6 minutes, the bacon still seemed to be raw. So, I cooked the bacon for a total of 12 minutes to make sure it was crispy but not burned. After cooking the entire package, there was no grease to drain out of the frying pan. This was a nice surprise. Usually, when I cook pork bacon, I have to drain the pain once during cooking and then again after cooking to remove the grease. With the turkey bacon, there was no extra cleanup.

Then, it was time for the taste test. Each slice was chewy, not crispy like traditional pork bacon. It didn't have that smoky bacon flavor. Instead, it tasted like turkey. Sadly, the makers of turkey bacon had let us down. I thought that this product would have the taste of traditional smoky pork bacon, but with the lower fat benefits of turkey. I was sadly mistaken.

Overall, Jennie-O Turkey bacon was a healthier option for my family, but it was a less tasty one as well. I think I would prefer to eat soy bacon over Turkey Bacon. Soy products tend to attempt to capture the regular flavor of the product they are trying to imitate, so the consumer doesn't know the difference. But, the turkey bacon from Jennie-O didn't attempt to do this at all. Instead, it simply made a healthier option with a very different taste in the hopes that consumers would prefer this new healthier turkey bacon.

If you would like to know more about products from Jenni-O, you can take a look at their website www.jennieo.com