Friday, September 20, 2013

Word of the Day: Bacon

Bacon on burgers, BLTs

Gimme that bacon

With eggs, please!

I love trivia! Do you? And what better subject than BACON! Perhaps all you know about bacon is that it is a meat product prepared from a pig and it goes with just about anything! We will get to some bacony combinations (usual and unusual) later but right now let's take a walk down history lane and when, where, how this succulent meat found its way to the table, especially America's breakfast table.

Let's begin with a little humor and your familiarity with the catchphrase "bringing home the bacon." More than likely you have related it to money when in actuality it bears relationship to the spirit of matrimonial harmony. Here's how the story goes:

A church in the English town of Dunmow, Essex promised a flitch (side) of bacon to any married man who could swear before the congregation and God that he had not quarreled with his wife for a year and a day. A husband who could bring home the bacon was held in high esteem by the community for his forbearance, self-control, patience and ability to serve an English breakfast.

What was then the town of Dunmow, became the town of Great Dunmow which still holds The Dunmow Flitch Trials every 4 years and awards a flitch of bacon (a salted and cured side) to married couples if they can satisfy the Judge and Jury of 6 maidens and 6 bachelors that in twelve months and a day they have not wished themselves unmarried again.

The phrase bring home the bacon later evolved into meaning generate household income, but sometimes the person saying it may have actually said it literally, historically the European peasant diet included bacon as it was a relatively inexpensive kind of meat compared to other cuts. [Source: The History of Bacon]

Embrace the Past...

Bacon dates back as early as 1500 BC. During that era, the Chinese began curing pork bellies with salt. That's a long time ago, folks! In the early 5th century, Anglo-Saxons used bacon fat for cooking & salad dressing. In the 1600s, smoked bacon was noted as the bacon of highest quality. Then, in 1770, John Harris set up the first bacon processing plant in Wiltshire. From there, bacon popularity grew and grew with Wiltshire in England being the center of bacon since the 18th century and is still considered the bacon capital of the world. It wasn't until 1924 that Oscar Mayer introduced pre-sliced, pre-packaged bacon to America.

With 2 billion+ pounds of bacon being produced yearly in the USA, that means people are devouring bacon beyond the simple menu of bacon and eggs at breakfast time. Of course, there is knowledge to be gained as to how this combination first adorned the American breakfast table. Check out...

How ‘Bacon and Eggs’ Became the American Breakfast

Empower the Present...

What is it about bacon that makes it so-o-o-o-o-o-o good? Got to be it's aroma, as well as its distinct flavor!

There is: bacon ice cream; bacon-infused vodka; deep-fried bacon; chocolate-dipped bacon; bacon-wrapped hot dogs filled with cheese; brioche bread pudding smothered in bacon sauce; hard-boiled eggs coated in mayonnaise encased in bacon — called, appropriately, the 'heart attack snack'; bacon salt; bacon doughnuts, cupcakes and cookies; bacon mints; 'baconnaise', which Jon Stewart described as 'for people who want to get heart disease but are too lazy to actually make bacon'; Wendy's 'Baconnator' — six strips of bacon mounded atop a half-pound cheeseburger — which sold 25 million in its first eight weeks; and the outlandish 'bacon explosion' — a barbecued meat brick composed of 2 pounds of bacon wrapped around 2 pounds of sausage.

— Arun Gupta, The Indypendent

Test your Bacon IQ:

Bacon Me Crazy: Bacon Quiz

Enrich the Future...

Who knows what to expect in the future when it comes to bacon. Stores now offer turkey bacon and veggie bacon. The toaster bacon of 1975 already flopped so not much hope of that coming back. Without any doubt, bacon is here to stay, just the way it is served will continue to be different!

Perhaps you have some favorite, unique, totally different ways to serve bacon. Enrich bacon's future by sharing more and more ways of preparing those bacony dishes so folks will always want more and more! Just remember...