Archives for the 'This Week in Bacon' Category
This Week in Bacon
We love the folks over at Bacon Freak, who bring us Bacon of the Month clubs, Bacon Jerky (which is delicious, by the way), and the phrase “Bacon is Meat Candy.” Well Bacon Freak’s Boss Hog now has a bacon cookbook on sale and available at baconcookbook.com. What an amazing idea – a cookbook devoted solely to our favorite crispy treat! Here’s what to expect:
We reached out to some of the worlds finest and most popular chefs, who are respected and renowned throughout the culinary world for their ability to consistently find the PERFECT presentation of each food that they serve.
These gastronomical gourmands were requested to come up with their very own, unique and original recipe to best prepare Bacon Freak bacon in a meal that most truly suites its qualities, flavors, aromas and textures in an ultimate blend with other top quality foods.
We were absolutely amazed by the response that we got, not only by the prime character of the recipes that we received, but in the pure number of chefs who wanted to participate. Over an extended period of time, we were able to put together the optimum collection of gourmet bacon recipes that will make this initial collection the phenomenon that we hoped it would prove to be.
The book has recipes from chefs and baconphiles who have trained around the world, including Cambodia and France, and across the country, from LA to Atlanta to Washington, D.C. The chefs introduce their take on bacon and each brings a unique flavor to the oh-so-versatile “meat candy.” Pick up a copy today – it’ll make a great gift for you or a friend (or that extra special bacon blogger in your life . . . ahem)!
This Week in Bacon
Art through the eyes of a foodie: London-based photographer Carl Warner photographs “foodscapes.” Everything you see in these photos are made of actual food (and mostly meat). Enjoy! Who needs Candyland when you can have Baconland?
What a vision . . . constructing something like that takes true talent and creativity. Here’s another great piece – imagine walking in this winter baconland . . .
In this last photograph in the series of high cholesterol art, take a look at the prosciutto sky. Amazing. I suddenly have a craving for Fogo de Chao. This really is advertising at its best.
[Via Geekologie]
This Week in Bacon
This is a GREAT week for bacon, as a recent study reveals this deliciously crispy treat actually makes you smarter! University of North Carolina researchers found that starting your baby on a diet of bacon while in the womb actually contributes to better memory later on in life. Well, kind of. Daily Mail reports,
Women are usually given a list of foods to avoid during pregnancy and it is well documented that a pregnant woman’s diet can affect her unborn baby.
But the new study suggests that a chemical in pork products and eggs can help the baby’s growing brain to develop.
Scientists at the University of North Carolina have discovered that the micronutrient, called choline, is vital in helping babies in the womb develop parts of their brains linked to memory and recall.
In a study of the effects of choline on the brains of baby mice, those fed small doses of choline while in the womb had genetic differences to those given large amounts.
Dr Gerald Weissmann, editor-in-chief of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology journal, which published the research told The Telegraph: ‘We may never be able to call bacon a health food with a straight face, but [similar studies] are already making us rethink what we consider healthy and unhealthy.’
Other products high in choline include soy, nuts, liver, chicken, and milk (although I would likely just stick with copious amounts of bacon and the occasional side of eggs). While I do love the results of the study, I have just one question: Bacon may help your child’s memory, but what about her heart?
This Week in Bacon
It has been a busy week for our favorite crispy treat. Here are some bacon bits for you:
They say breakfast is the most important meal of the day. So, start it off right with a “freakish but tasty” bacon and egg martini, made “with house-made bacon-infused vodka and garnished with a pickled quail egg.” [L.A. Times]
No more singed fingers or grease-splattered hands for you bacon-cookers. There’s a new invention out there, considered to be one of the “select few inventions that have changed the course of human history.” Bacon Tongs: “Set to Change the World.” [NBC]
In a side-by-side comparison, bacon is healthier AND tastes better than sausage. That’s not really news to us, though. [FitSugar]
Wrap-up for 2009. A “study” shows menu items with bacon are up 26.5 percent from 2005. Moreover, the number of bacon-topped sandwiches at surveyed restaurants has increased by 35.8%. Minyanville professor Ryan Krueger explains this recent surge in bacon consumption, describing bacon as the “recessionary version of the truffle.” [Minyanville]
Outlook for 2010. Bacon is determined to be one of the top five food trends for 2010. Other food trends for the new year? “[W]ine cocktails and a consumer backlash against ubiquitous nutritional claims by food manufacturers.” [Daily Dish]
A meaty Martini
After an evening spent flirting and chatting at the bar, your witty repartee and charming good looks have brought her back to your place. The lights are dim, candles are lit, jazz is playing softly, and you had the foresight to hide your comic book collection earlier in the day. All that stands between you and an unforgettable night of passion is one perfectly made Martini. You suavely gather the necessary materials: Two crystal glasses, pre-chilled of course. A mixing glass. A long spoon. A cast iron frying pan. A slice of bacon.
The meat sizzles as it hits the frying pan; so does she. While the bacon crisps you pour vodka over ice. You give it a seductive stir, the metal spoon barely clinking against the glass. You pour the Martinis, snap the bacon into pieces, and tantalizingly drop them into the drinks. She cocks an eyebrow, curious. You toast, she sips. A look of disgust creeps across her face. Suddenly she has an important meeting in the morning and really must be going. You fool, you’ve used a non-premium bacon flavored vodka!
This is where Bakon, “a premium bacon flavored vodka,” might have saved your night. It was only a matter of time before two of the food world’s biggest trends — flavoring vodkas and putting bacon where it doesn’t belong — collided with potentially disastrous results. But knowing that it was my sacred duty as a Crispy on the Outside blogger to sample all things bacon-related, I broke down and bought a bottle.
Continue reading this post »
This Week in Bacon
The latest bacon craze concoction is brought to you by bacon lovers Christian Williams and Melissa Tillman of San Mateo, California. The winners of the BaconCamp contest in San Francisco created Bacone, a breakfast treat that’s delicious – and easy – to eat. The Bacone consists of:
three strips of bacon deep fried to make a cone shape, filled with a mixture of scrambled eggs, hash browns and cheese, and topped with biscuits and country gravy.
The breakfast-food concoction not only won the judges’ choice award, but also landed Williams an appearance on the Food Network and Gourmet magazine featured him in a story about what it called the Gross Food Movement.
For complete instructions on how to make the Bacone, click here.
What a perfect messy breakfast for your morning commute! While there have been mixed reviews on the Bacone, the sweet and savory sounds pretty scrumptious to me.
This Week in Bacon
Most bacon lovers love bacon because it tastes so good. But who ever thought that you could use bacon for other purposes, like making a fashion statement? Apparently Jia Jem did, as she made a dress out of bacon and salami for an Aqua Teen Hunger Force birthday party the other day.
Yes, she actually used real meat:
I chose salami because it’s thin, keeps in one piece, and is quite cheap, and bacon because it looks very, um, meaty. I considered somehow vacuum-sealing sheets of meat with those sealers they have on the markets now, but the machines were too expensive for a one-time-only disposeable dress. I ended up using the K.I.S.S. method of construction, which involved a basic shift dress out of thick cotton. I layed the meat on top, then put clear vinyl over it and sewed tracks with clear thread. I used a wide stitch length to avoid perforating the meat to the point it might just… uh, slide down the bottom of the dress. I also blotted it all before sewing to get rid of as much grease as possible to avoid clouding the vinyl. Lastly, I made sure to bind the bottom of the dress with a strip of clear vinyl to catch drips. (I love talking about this; it’s so disgusting.) The whole project took about 6 hours, and I kept it refrigerated until the party. Good times.
[Via BoingBoing and Geekologie]
This Week in Bacon
The latest drinks to hit happy hour menus: the Bakon Mary and the Bakon Chocolate Martini, mixed with the finest (or only) bacon-flavored vodka. Black Rock Spirits of Seattle just recently launched “Bakon” vodka, made from Idaho potatoes:
Bakon Vodka is a superior quality potato vodka with a savory bacon flavor. It’s clean, crisp, and delicious. This is the only vodka you’ll ever want to use to make a Bloody Mary, and it’s a complementary element of both sweet and savory drinks.
Bakon Vodka is also a great Bar-B-Q companion. Use it in a marinade or sip it chilled with a steak. Check out our recipes section for more ideas.
[...]
We start with superior quality Idaho potatoes instead of the random mixed grains that make up most vodkas. Our vodka is column-distilled using a single heating process that doesn’t “bruise” the alcohol like the multiple heating cycles needed to make a typical pot-still vodka.
No tinge or burn on the tongue, no obnoxious smoky or chemical flavors, just a clean refreshing potato vodka with delicious savory bacon flavor.
In the words of the Bakon vodka creators: “Pure. Refreshing. Bacon.” Coming soon (hopefully really soon) to a bar near you.
This Week in Bacon
Today’s the day, bacon fans. Heather Lauer’s long-awaited paean to bacon–which she may have announced publicly the existence thereof for the first time right here at Crispy–is released today.
To write the book, Lauer, proprietor of Bacon Unwrapped, traveled the country to learn the story of bacon from the people who raise the pigs, serve up bacon, and create cutting-edge bacon dishes.
Order your copy of Bacon: A Love Story: A Salty Survey of Everybody’s Favorite Meat today. Kindle it here.
Congrats Heather!
This Week in Bacon
Following in Paris Hilton’s footsteps, Padma Lakshmi, host of Top Chef, now stars in her own Carl’s Jr. commercial. The commercial — a 24-second ad — promotes the Western Bacon Cheeseburger. Watch as pieces of mayonnaise and bacon bits strategically fall on random parts of her body, so that she can entice the viewers by subsequently licking them away, or as she puts it, getting rid of the “evidence.” NY Daily News reports that this commercial isn’t the only place Padma promotes the burger:
But the sultry star isn’t just indulging for the camera. In her own cookbook “Tangy, Tart, Hot and Sweet,” she credits the grab and go burger joint for awakening her from her vegetarian slumber as a teenager.
“The sublimely pleasurable taste of bacon … was further enhanced by its mingling with the barbeque sauce, greedily licked off as it dripped down my teenage fingers,” she wrote.
And I thought Padma and I had nothing in common . . . never underestimate the power of bacon to provide common ground between strangers.
This Week in Bacon
As someone who likes to think he has a bit of food-tattoo cred–I’ve had a steaming cup of coffee inked on my left arm for about 15 years–I’m still impressed by the image at right.
That’s a version of the BaconFreak.com logo tattooed on some pork-obsessed dude’s still-raw arm. At least I think it’s an arm.
More here.
In related news, for those of you who find Bacon Salt to be cool but lacking in, um, actual bacon, BaconFreak.com has you covered with their new line of bacon-flavored seasonings that are actually flavored with bacon.
This Week in Bacon
Here’s an idea for a competition, based on the popular turn-of-the-millenium game, Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon. We all know the game, which posits that “any actor can be linked through his or her film roles to actor Kevin Bacon.”
Well, my game, which I’m calling Three Degrees of Bacon, works as follows:
Any food can be linked to bacon, via a recipe published in print or online, by three or fewer degrees of separation.
Even with me halving the degrees of separation from the SDoKB, with the explosion of bacon-in-everything recipes, I’m thinking this shouldn’t be too difficult. Even stinky durian gets there in the requisite three steps, thanks to both it and bacon appearing in ice cream recipes. I invite you all to try to prove me wrong.
This Week in Bacon
It’s 2009. The most common New Year’s resolution people make is probably to get healthy or to lose weight. Deciding how to accomplish this is the hard part. You could do Atkins or South Beach or the Tabasco sauce/water/lemon diet. But those aren’t enjoyable, and they require too much effort. What if your diet could consist of something you actually LOVE to eat, like, say, bacon! Well, that’s exactly what a San Diego man decided to do: an all bacon, all the time diet.
The San Diego resident has embarked on a month-long “nothing but bacon” diet. He’s eating just over a pound of bacon a day–that’s bacon for every meal for all of February. Why? Well, as explained in an NBC video report, he’s an SD website personality, and the site’s readers have joined the rest of the country in having an obsession with the divine pork product. The fondness for pork fat inspired Nelson to go on a bacon-y trip down memory lane and then the idea of “the bacon diet” was born.
“There can never be too much bacon,” says the man who admits he’s “not a huge fan of vegetables.”
Sure, this sounds like a great diet, but the point of a diet is to get healthy, right? Is this realistic on a nothing-but-bacon diet?
Well, Nelson says he’s lost weight and his blood pressure has gone down. He attributes this partly to his getting full pretty fast and not leading him to eat starches. Nelson also rationalizes that “pork fat is very similar to olive oil,” so you’ve got “perfect proportion of protein and fat.”
It’s worth a try, right? Bacon: cheap, easy, and delicious. And if I can lower my blood pressure and lose weight . . . sounds like the perfect diet to me! Now, all I have to worry about is my cholesterol. And I’m pretty sure it’s not safe to continue the diet past a month . . . you remember what happened to Morgan Spurlock, from Super Size Me. You don’t want to end up like that.
This Is Why You’re Fat
No, really. This Is Why You’re Fat.
Click through for hot dog pie, the McNuggetini, bacon cheeseburgers with chocolate covered bacon, and so much more.
This Week in Bacon
Bacon truism: everything tastes better with bacon. But how about bacon bacon bacon, 24/7? Could you eat nothing but bacon for a whole month? I mean, (nearly) everything tastes better with Tabasco, but I most certainly couldn’t subsist on it alone for a day, nevermind a month.
Nevertheless, one dude is on a visionary quest to eat bacon every day this monthlet:
I’ll get right to the good stuff: for the entire month of February, 2009, I, Michael J. Nelson will eat nothing but bacon. Nothing, my friends, but bacon.
Why? Because bacon is nature’s finest and most nourishing food. Also, because several doubters on the RiffTrax staff had the unmitigated gall to insult bacon by making the outrageous claim that, as good as it is, no one could eat very much of it and live. I can and will. Therefore I will spend the month proving it.
Via @BaconUnwrapped.
Surprisingly, this is only the second weirdest food news I’ve read today. First prize goes to Gwyneth Paltrow, who writes about the joys of “bowel elimination” at her personal website, Goop.com.
