Vegan Rice Paper Bacon - Perfect, 25 Minutes

Difficulty: 2/5 (5 being hardest)
Spice Level: 1/3 (3 being spiciest)

Prep & Cook Time: 25 minutes
Servings: 4

The Challenge: Bacon

Well, its about the hardest thing I hear from meat eaters to give up - bacon. 

The salty/crispy/smoky flavor is something that Americans (and I think a lot of others) seem to just be obsessed with. I haven't had any in a couple decades, and I'm still kicking haha. 

Why? Because I designed a perfect replacement to your bacon needs with rice paper. I'm not the first to attempt rice paper bacon, but I guarantee you there isn't a better rice paper bacon recipe on the market. I've worked on this for years to get the marinade just right. 

Best part about your rice paper bacon? Besides amazing flavors, it has insane versatility as well as has NO CHOLESTEROL. We've featured it in a number of recipes here already - BLTs, Breakfast Bagel Sandwiches, and even a Southern' favorite, Hoppin' John. 

There are two keys to making this work - marinade and cook time. The marinade is measured just right for you to make wonderfully flavored vegan bacon. The crispiness comes from the oven. We'll bake this dish for about 8-10 minutes at 400F. I always check it at 8 minutes to see where I'm at. My oven is like 9:15 to get it perfect. IMPORTANT - your bacon crisps a bit more once out of the oven. Don't let it go past 9-10 minutes as it will burn super fast.

If you have a convection option on your oven, definitely use it and the bacon turns out even better but needs about 30-60 seconds less cooking.

Alright well its time for the salty, crispy, smoky, yummy, taste bud explosion of flavor rice paper bacon!!!

Let's get into it!

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Rice Paper Bacon

• 10 sheets of rice paper (spring roll sheets)

• 3 tbl olive oil

• 2 tbl nutritional yeast

• 2 tbl liquid aminos

• 1 tsp garlic powder

• 1 tsp onion powder

• 1 tsp chili powder

• 1 tsp sea salt

• 1/2 tsp liquid smoke

• 1 tbl maple syrup

• 1 tsp smoked paprika

• pinch or two of black pepper

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Equipment You'll Need:

Cutting Board . Sharp Cutting Knife or Kitchen Shears . Measuring Spoons . Medium Baking Sheet . Small Bowl of Water . Parchment Paper . Mixing Bowl . Pastry/Marinade Brush

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Before You Cook:

• Preheat oven to 400F

• Line baking sheet with parchment paper

1. To start, using kitchen shears or a sharp knife (prefer kitchen shears), cut the rice paper bacon sheets into 5-6 lengthwise pieces. If using a knife, make sure its sharp and cut by pressing down on top of sheet and on a cutting board, moving towards you.

2. Don't worry too much about the width of the bacon pieces. When you are done, you'll have a large stack of varying pieces.

3. To form, find two like pieces of rice paper and stack them together. I like to stack all my pairs on a parchment sheet before wetting.

4. Holding the pair together, dunk it in a bowl of water and as you bring out of the water run your fingers down the sheets to remove excess water. Place onto parchment paper.

5. All your pairs should be wet and formed together on your parchment sheet. You may need a second baking sheet lined with parchment paper depending on how large your baking sheet is.

6. Next, mix together your marinade. These are the ingredients below rice paper.

7. To marinade your rice paper, use a kitchen/pastry brush to coat with a healthy layer on each rice paper sheet. Dab your brush in once and remove for each side. Once your first sides are done, gently flip the bacon pieces and marinade the other side. If you have marinade leftover, keep adding more to the sheets till its gone.

8. Bake the rice paper at 400F for 8-10 minutes. Check it at 8 and if its crispy remove. I remove mine at just over 9 minutes nearly every time. Watch closely to make sure it doesn't burn!

9. Enjoy! Serve it up with plenty of favorites like BLT / Tacos / Breakfast Sandwiches and many more!

Vegan BLT Sandwich w/ Rice Paper Bacon, Heirloom Tomato, and Arugula Jesus - it looks good huh. I love BLTs. I used to eat them with old green box Morningstar Farms bacon, but after becoming a vegan, I have not had many since most bacon replacements are not vegan. So, I wanted to crush that issue. But how to make an easy vegan bacon that wouldn't require too much work. Enter rice paper. I had seen some rice paper recipes, but I had felt like they were pretty hard, easy-to-burn, or just didn't have the flavor. The key to this BLT is really the marinade. I worked a lot on the marinade and then texture. Rice paper works well because it crisps really nicely, and it is also very easy to work with. For the marinade, it was a bit of trial and error, but the key is liquid smoke, a bit of maple syrup, smoked paprika, nutritional yeast, some garlic + onion powder, and a few extras. But how do we make this into bacon? Wet the paper, squish it together, lay on parchment, and slap on some marinade. Bake it on high heat and crisp it. Then eat a ton of it. GUILT FREE BACON YAYYYYYYYY!   Aggregate rating will show here Serves 4 Ingredients: 10 sheets of rice paper, 2 tbl olive oil, 2 tbl nutritional yeast, 2 tbl liquid aminos, 1/2 tbl garlic salt, 1 tsp onion powder, 1 tsp chipotle chili powder, 1/3 tsp liquid smoke, 1/2 tbl maple syrup, 1 tsp smoked paprika, 4 pretzel rolls, 2 medium heirloom tomatoes, sliced, 4 large handfuls of arugula, 6 tbl (or so) of vegan mayo,