April 20, 2013 Chicago Baconfest coming, Smithfield bacon review

MY LIFE WITH BACON continues this week with anticipation of Baconfest Chicago, an annual gathering downtown to celebrate and consume swine meat of all varieties.  There are sister events in San Francisco and Washington, D.C.  Unfortunately, tickets sold out too quickly for me to get any this year!  I'll be trolling for good deals on the secondary market, however.  Check out their logo!  Obviously a take-off on the City of Chicago's flag, it's clearly bacon'd up!  Ever wonder about the stars on Chicago's flag?  Here's that story.



I TAPPED A GREAT FAMILY FRIEND, Jake Schneider, who is a Prep Cook at RPM Italian in Chicago to see if his high level foodie connections could scam me a ticket. Check out  RPM's menu - it's absolutely fantastic! Jake, who makes ALL the pasta at RPM from scratch every day, wasn't able to come through for me.  These tickets are a hot commodity! However, Jake recommended this DIY Baconfest-  a list of alternative Chicago restaurants with limited-time bacon-themed selections.


A NEW, RECURRING FEATURE STARTS NOW:

THIS WEEK IN BACON NEWS.  There were several stories about bacon recipes this week, but none of note.  However, I did run across this article in the Huffington Post entitled

Bacon Mistakes to Avoid: How to Cook Bacon

The article is outstanding.  Here are the mistakes to avoid in case you don't want to click the link:

1. Don't cook cold bacon.  Let it warm to room temperature (same is true of steak, by the way)
2. Don't start bacon in a hot pan.  (You can see from my pics that I follow this rule religiously)
3. Don't crowd the pan (they say it causes steaming of the bacon; I'm not so sure if the temp is right)
4. Don't pile bacon on top of itself in the pan (true - you want all pieces to be touching the pan always)
5. Don't buy cheap, sad, thin bacon (we test them all here, but don't try that at home!)
6. Don't burn your bacon ('nuff said)
7. Don't throw out the bacon fat (it has too many uses, like melted with butter on a great steak)

TO THAT LIST, I add my own "best practices" for bacon cooking:

1. Cut off the curled pieces (I call them MJ pieces in honor of Michael Jordan's commercial) and cook them separately - in keeping with #4, we want all the surfaces of the bacon to be cooking on the pan.
2. Use a heavy duty baster tool, made of metal and silicone, to suck off the fat as you cook, and put it in a chemistry beaker or Pyrex glass for later storage.
3. Dont' use too high a heat setting - aside from burning the bacon, it tastes better if it's slow cooked, and is much less likely to curl up.
4. Don't use the microwave!  It may be fast and convenient but nothing compares to pan frying.

ON TO THIS WEEK'S REVIEW
Let me start by saying that nothing is going to compare to last week's post.  But here we go.
This week we're testing

Smithfield Naturally Hickory Smoked

The Smithfield bacon was thickly cut and looked mighty fine in the packaging.  Their website looks good, and they have a lot of bacon.  I think I'll test them again... smelled like it should; nice hickory scent.  Cooked up with a lot of character.  However, it totally lacked crispness as well as succulence, so it fails on both of those counts.  It weighed in at a full 16 ounces and post cooking was 5.9 ounces, well above average.  Generated 170 ml of bacon lard.

Overall, a bit disappointing.  For a thick sliced bacon that had great packaging and pre-cook smell, it was a let down. 

	Smithfield Hickory Smoked
Crispiness	2
Flavor	2
Succulence	2
Smell	4
Rendered Fat	High
Overall	2.5

THE POST IS LATE TODAY, because we had an 8am baseball tournament (13U).  The good news was that our son Jack was 2 for 2 with a walk, and drove in the tying run in the bottom of the last inning.  He pitched two innings and only gave up one run - lowest ERA of the team.  The bad news is that the game started at 8am, so we had to leave the house by 6:30.  And it's still cold here in Chicagoland - temp was 30 when I looked at the thermometer in the back yard.  On the way back, we had breakfast (at 11:15 AM) at the Wildberry restaurant in Libertyville, IL.  They had what they described as a 'thick, applewood smoked, great bacon".  Cooked up, it appears below.  It rates a one in every category.  Not good.  Flat, not crispy, no smell, almost flavorless.  Never again. 

Ever hear of Bacon Road?  Neither have I, but it would be cool to live there.  On the way back, we passed this street in Round Lake, IL.  Very cool.

Finally, check out this storefront picture, courtesy of one of Debbie's colleagues (via a tumblr user).