Bacon: Greased-Up Gateway to the Gods

Want some extra fun this week? Play the JunkMalesDrinkingGame! Every time you see the word “bacon” take a drink! It’s more or less how we wrote this post anyway.

On the cusp of modern technological bacon advancements.

Welcome to our bacon post! If you haven’t guessed, this week’s theme is bacon, and boy are you guys in for a salty treat! With the exception of our vegetarian or religiously inclined “friends”, nearly every true American holds in their heart a special place for bacon (their valves). We eat it in our sandwiches, we grind it up on our salads, we half-jokingly adorn our maple bars with meaty, bacony crowns. Whether you like it crispy, chewy, or turkey, bacon seems to be the next big thing in junkfood flavoring. Dare we even say, that

BACON IS THE NEW RANCH?

Daren’t we? Let’s take a look at bacon’s recent transformation from breakfast staple to toothpick flavor and we can decide for ourselves. Don’t think we’re gonna share the answer with you, though.

A Pause For Brevity

In deference to the length of our last post, I have decided to briefly sum up the main points we are trying to touch on this time for those of you in a hurry to get back to watching reruns of 90210 and eating marginally rancid mayonnaise with your fingers.

• Bacon is good.
• We like junkfood.
• In 1952 Albert Einstein was offered the Presidency of Israel, which he declined, and the 99th element of the Periodic Table, Einsteinium, was discovered and named in his honor. He probably also liked bacon.

Satisfied? Good. Now let’s get down to business.

And He Said, Let There Be Bacon

Crispity, chocolatey Pig Candy.

Although it would appear that creating innovative bacon delectables has in recent years become fashionable and trendy, please trust us when we say that 1: we are certainly not fashionable, nor are we trendy* and 2: our love of bacon is pure. We may enjoy what this media dubbed “Bacon Mania” has done for our taste buds, but that is not why we nightly rub bacon grease all over our bodies and wrestle in children’s swimming pools, and it is not why we are writing this brilliant article now. We were eating bacon long before the fad began and will continue eating bacon long after it has gone the way of Crystal Pepsi and Ring Pops. While the fad is still alive and well, however, we will take advantage of it every chance we get. From snacking on some of New York’s famous Pig Candy, chocolate dipped bacon, to feasting on a slice of a Bacon Explosion, over four pounds of bacon barbecue goodness, any opportunity is a good opportunity to stuff our mouths full of fried pork belly.

Much like salmonella and rat droppings, bacon can still be found in its more traditional stomping grounds of breakfast and brunch type establishments. One of my favorite discoveries of late has been a breakfast sandwich called the Hostile Hangover Takeover that I stumbled across at a local cafe. Besides having a long-winded moniker, this breakfast king among breakfast men boasts a drippingly delicious array of ingredients. Starting on a garlic bagel, Mr. Takeover contains several strips of, you guessed it, bacon, as well as a sausage patty, home fries, cheddar cheese, ketchup and Tabasco sauce. It’s enough to make any junkfood man blush, but is it advertised accurately? Can it really takeover a hostile hangover or takeover a hangover hostilely? As a man of science with no agenda other than the expansion of my own scientific mind, I set out recently, by a strange coincidence right around Saint Patrick’s Day, to test whether or not this sandwich truly lived up to its name.

(Not enough drinking yet? Bacon bacon bacon bacon bacon!)

Fun Fact! Did you know that the phrase "bringing home the bacon" comes from 12th century England where a church in the town of Dunmow gave men a side of bacon if they swore they had not fought with their wives for a year and a day? Learning is fun!

The preparation was of course the hardest and most grueling aspect of the experiment but so strong was my desire to earn respect in the scientific junkfood community that I poured everything I had into fully readying myself. Over a roughly 12 our period and in the presence of a small army of fellow green-clad scientists, drink after drink found its way through my tightly grimaced visage. The task was indeed arduous and I have no wish to relive all the gruesome details here, but in the end it was worth it and my reward was paid to me tenfold when I awoke the next day. I was no pretty picture as I dragged myself from bed, but after drinking some water and stumbling around confusedly for a while I was able to make my way to the aforementioned cafe and purchase this supposed cure-all for hangovers. It. Was. Awesome. The bacon was crispy, the cheese was melty, the bagel was bagely, and it all came together in a symphony of reduced nausea and lessened head pains. Maybe it was the sleep, maybe the water, or maybe I just didn’t get as drunk as I thought I did but I like to think that it was the Hostile Hangover Takeover, aided by my good friend bacon, that got me through my Act Of Science in style.

BACON: FAD, OR RAD?

I’m sure that all of our devoted readers live in some kind of town, or city, or city-state (I’m looking at you, Singapore!). It is fairly safe to assume that, within these larger cities, there is some kind of “gag” gift shop or purveyor of notably silly whosits and gizmotrons. The second one walks into such an establishment, one wouldn’t be too far mistaken to believe that they have entered some sort of bacon shrine or shangri-la. These stores are filled with items that shouldn’t be related to bacon, but are! If you’ve never experienced this for yourself it’s almost worth getting off the couch for, almost. An abridged list of some of these purchasable and personable baconproducts will come… right now: bacon flavored floss, bacon jelly beans, and a bacon version of Candyland. Even though it stings, a thought runs into your head, “Where is all this shit coming from? And who buys it?!” The ‘who’ should be obvious to even the most numbskullish of neurosurgeons: everyone, duh. As to the ‘where’, a simple scan of the label will reveal this darkest of secrets to you.

Accoutrements USA, located in the backwoods of these esteemed author’s hometown, designs, constructs, and distributes an estimated 40% of all bacon related products within the US. These goliaths of the gag-gift industry have tapped into America’s love affair with bacon, and seem to be turning a pretty good profit from it. Some may ask the question “Is this wrong? Are they just pimping out the good name of bacon to turn a quick buck?” I mean, it’s a pretty good question, and I don’t say that just because I wrote it. I say it because I love bacon, just as much if not more than the next red-blooded, cholesterol-encrusted American. As we all know, blogs are absolutely no place for opinions, but I, we, must dare to be different and take a firm stand on this slippery issue. For, late as it may be to do anything about it, we do not want bacon to get lost in the history books as just another “hip” fad, like finger mustache tattoos or Ed Hardy t-shirts.

We are fine with those who strive to make a little money off bacon’s delicious taste as long as it’s done in a classy manner. Restaurants do it all the time, and who are we to argue with TGI Friday’s BBQ Bacon Shrimp? What we are opposed to, however, is the mindless over-commercialization of the meaty lifeblood of a people, nay, a nation. But let’s be honest, despite our strong moral fiber we still like the products; they are hilarious. I mean, look at the ingredients list for the bacon soap- “bacon fragrance”. Genius! You have to actually call the company for the ingredients list of the mints, and we can only imagine they are filled with the lost and forgotten trash can scrapings that we are better off not knowing about. If they are anything like Baconaisse, which ironically enough, also hails from Seattle, they are most likely vegan and kosher, somehow. Is that possible? I don’t know, but they seem to have found a way.

In summation, we, The Junk Males, would like to state our love for bacon, for the hundredth time this post. It has seen us through some rough times, it has been scientifically proven to cure hangovers, and it lines the shelves of our favorite shops.  We stand by it through thick and thin (slicing). It’s a given that the next time The Junk Males get together for a “business meeting,” we will be snacking on a few strips of our favorite salted meat. So go ahead, take a bite out of life, ignore all of your doctor’s warnings and fry up some bacon. And don’t forget to drink the grease, for good luck!

*Unfortunately you have to be logged into Facebook to see these two links but trust me, it’s worth it.