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A single adult pig can yield around 160 pounds of meat — of that, about 20 pounds can be made into bacon, which is enough to fill several commercial packs. But is that really what happens, or does one bacon pack contain meat from more than one pig? We spoke about this topic with Jess Pryles, a live-fire cooking expert, meat educator, and founder of the Hardcore Carnivore brand. You can also catch Pryles — who will be publishing a book titled "Prime Cuts" in October 2026 – on Food Network's new "Pitmasters" show.
Pork belly is the affordable pork cut that's commonly used to make flavorful American bacon. "In many cases, sliced bacon in a single retail pack is likely coming from the same pork belly/slab," Pryles told us. This mainly has to do with the efficiency of processing meat. "Once a pork belly has been cured, it's generally run through a slicer as a whole piece, then the slices are shingled and packed," she explained, highlighting that "it would be inefficient to slice multiple bellies, throw all those slices into a random pile, and then build packages from mixed pieces."
But it's not impossible. According to Pryles, a single pack could contain bacon from more than one pork belly, especially if the package is underweight. In that case, she said an extra slice or two may be added to the package. Pryles did note, however, that it's unlikely you could glean this information from the package alone.
Read more: 13 Types Of Fish You Should Think Twice About Before Buying
Is bacon better when it's sourced entirely from one pig?
Now that you know a pack of bacon is usually sourced from a single pig, the question arises whether that package is superior in quality to the one put together from two different pork bellies. "Commercial bacon is produced to a consistent spec, so even if slices from more than one belly ended up in a pack, they should be very similar in cure, thickness, fat level, and overall style," Jess Pryles assured us. When the mixing does happen, the practice is "not a quality concern or anything sinister — it's just normal portioning."
When Tasting Table asked Pryles if it's possible to specifically request bacon from a single pig at the butcher, she doubled down on her previous point. "There is no reason to require that the bacon is from a single animal. It somehow suggests that there's something wrong with sourcing from several, and there's not." When you're making bacon-wrapped shrimp or the ultimate egg sandwich, it really shouldn't matter whether the bacon came from one pig or two. Either way, it's delicious.
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Read the original article on Tasting Table.
