Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Seduced by Bacon


It's not a mystery that I love books. My office is so inundated with them, I'm starting to lose track of the titles because that they double stacked on the bookshelf. Along with my beautiful collection of classics and modern fiction, I am also an avid collector of cookbooks. I have sixty eight at last count. With fabulous titles like New York- Authentic Recipes Celebrating the Foods of the World and The Italian Chef's Encyclopedia. And I use every last one of them. But my favorite title today is Seduced by Bacon by Joanna Pruess and Bob Lope. That title just makes me giggle. A cookbook devoted entirely to one specific kind of cured meat!

Actually, I am not a huge fan of bacon .

I do like the taste. It just doesn't like me. I can almost feel it slowing my heart as it settles on my arteries. It whispers (Yes bacon whispers. Just go with it.) "Tomorrow's long run is going to KILL you because you ate me." So I don't eat a lot of it.

My husband on the other hand actually believes pork belongs on the food pyramid somewhere between Moosetracks Ice Cream and Cherry Twizzlers. He believes that bacon is the key to longevity because his grandma ate a bacon sandwich every day for eighty one years. Is it just me or does everyone have a relative who ate bacon daily for eighty one years?

Being married to such a devoted bacon lover, I learned along time ago that bacon is a religion with a devoted mass of followers. Apparently, I'm agnostic. I don't deny the existence of Pork but I don't feel the need to worship it. But that didn't stop my indoctrinated husband from buying me Seduced by Bacon for Christmas several years ago. And it didn't stop me from reading it. I can be open minded on matters of religion.

By the time I read the section ominously titled Baconology I knew I was dealing with something larger than personal belief. We're talking a major cult here. Every single recipe in that book includes bacon! Yes, there are the old standbys like Bacon Cheddar Biscuits and Classic BLT's but there's also a dessert section! How does Pecan-Brown Sugar & Bacon Ice Cream sound? *Gulp*

I am not even kidding.

Who knew bacon had so much versatility?

But for the love my spouse and my bacon eating children I have tried to embrace bacon. Okay, so it's more of a handshake kind of relationship. But I'm learning to adjust. (Do you want to know a little secret? Sometimes I still serve Turkey Bacon to the kids. They never notice. My husband calls foul every time. Curse his pork sensitive pallet.)

I think the biggest thing I learned from this family treasured cookbook (aside from what happens when you combine bacon and peanut butter) is that there is a right and wrong way to cook bacon. You are not supposed to pan fry it. Did you know that?

No. No. The correct way to cook bacon is to lay it on rumpled aluminum foil on a cookie sheet and oven bake it at 400 degrees for 18- 20 minutes. This prevents shrinkage and makes for long beautiful strips of bacon. I am a huge fan of this cooking method. It eliminates grease spatter and if you use two cookie sheets it's actually much faster. I can cook an entire pound of bacon at once with minimal clean up. Just toss the foil when your finished.

I'm still not completely converted to the Church of Bacon but I'm much more respectful of those who are. If you can swallow a peanut butter and bacon sandwich, more power to you.

Who knows, maybe Bacon lovers married to health nuts are really the ones who suffer.





6 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm not going to lie. I enjoy some bacon now and again. My friend ate chocolate-covered bacon in Las Vegas a couple weeks ago. She liked it. I wanted to puke just thinking about it.

Melinda said...

Jill, I don't thing pregnancy and bacon mix very well.

I like the pre-cooked bacon and it has to be really lean, because all that fat makes me ill.

Also, this is a great commercial. This is what I do with my books when my husband comes home. Sorta.

Mary E Campbell said...

I love bacon!!! That's why I never buy it. I get bacon only when we go camping. Ahhhh my mouth waters just thinking about it.

going gordon said...

I've seen that bacon ad before! I love it! I like bacon too. In fact my kitchen still smells like it because i just made quiche this morning. I hate how it lingers...

Suzy Toronto Studios said...

I too cook bacon in the oven but to improve on your recipe one tiny bit, press brown sugar onto both sides of the bacon before cooking it and cook it until the sugar starts to get caramelized. Let it cool good and it turns into candy!(after all, if you're going to pork out on bacon, you might as well go all the way... We call it Pig Crunch! Yummmmm

By the way... speaking of bacon...you are all now one step away from Kevin Bacon. I did his hair once while working as a stylist on the movie "Foot Loose"...my 15 minutes of fame!

Hoontah said...

Ah! Six degrees of Kevin Bacon. I knew it! So I'm only two degrees away right? I feel so cool!

Thanks for the bacon trick Suzy. Everything is better with brown sugar on it. :)