Move over Ed Miliband! How Gen Z make a pig’s ear of the bacon butty

Those who love a traditional bacon sandwich might drop their rashers in disbelief after hearing how young people in the UK are making the dish.

It seems many prefer microwaving the meat – and have ditched ketchup for exotic hot sauces.

More than a quarter of all Britons (27 per cent) now use trendy air fryers to cook the bacon, while one in ten microwave it for convenience, data shows.

A study found three in ten Gen Z youngsters have turned their backs on ketchup and instead add hot sauces such as chilli, the spicy Mexican condiment chipotle, or peri peri to their bacon butty.

And 15 per cent of young adults sandwich their bacon between slices of every hipster’s favourite bread – sourdough.

Overall, half of Britons opt for ketchup as their sauce of choice, followed by HP (32 per cent) but more than one in ten (11 per cent) choose a dollop of mayo.

We should use two rashers of ‘slightly crispy’ smoked back bacon for the best butty, according to Britons quizzed by packaged meat firm The Jolly Hog.

But half of the UK’s Gen Z population use three strips of bacon instead.

Gen Z are opting to cook their bacon in the microwave and switching out classic ketchup for hotsauce

Soft white bread is the national favourite with two in five (39 per cent) keen on the classic, yet in Yorkshire and Scotland the bap dominates (40 per cent).

Nearly half of Britons grill their bacon, but frying is most popular among Gen Z (55 per cent).

Jolly Hog co-founder Olly Kohn said: ‘We’ve been obsessed with food for as long as we can remember, and bacon has always been right at the top.

‘There’s no single, perfect bacon sarnie but one thing’s clear – we’re all united by our love of the bacon sandwich.’