Sometimes, when I'm frying up bacon, it curls when I'm not looking. As it shrinks, some parts of the bacon strip lose contact with the pan, guaranteeing that my breakfast won't be as crispy as I was hoping. There have even been mornings when the bacon curled up into a pile, extra greasy rather than crispy.
If you have something to hold down your bacon--preventing it from curling up--breakfast goes a little better. Williams Sonoma sells a kitchen tool that does exactly that: the Bacon Press. This cast-iron press with a wooden handle is shaped like a pig. The Bacon Press holds bacon strips flat for fast frying. It minimizes shrinkage and cooks strips evenly. The Bacon Press is 8.5-inches long by 4.5-inches wide. It will fit in just about any 10-inch skillet.
The Bacon Press isn't just a one-use tool, either. You can use it to press quesadillas, grilled sandwiches, and just about anything that will fit in a skillet and you happen to want to flatten. The Bacon Press is hand-wash only, but that's to be expected--you wouldn't run your cast-iron skillet through the dishwasher, now would you?