Read Bacon Nation: 125 Irresistible Recipes Online
Authors: Peter Kaminsky,Marie Rama
Bacon Nation: 125 Irresistible Recipes (44 page)
Heritage Foods USA
Box 198
402 Graham Avenue
Brooklyn, New York 11211
(718) 389-0985
Founded by Patrick Martins, who was also the moving force behind Slow Food USA, this outpost of heritage breeds in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, supports some of America’s premier sustainable farmers of heritage breeds. You can buy pork, beef, and turkey from Heritage Foods USA, and we love its bacon program, which delivers a selection of six different bacon varieties every two months. A true bacon treat!
Hormel Natural Choice
Hormel Natural Choice bacon is free of added colors, flavors, and preservatives and has a winning proportion of meat to fat. The bacon is available at supermarkets nationally. We loved it in our Bacon Bolognese with Saffron (
page 191
).
Jones Dairy Farm
601 Jones Avenue
Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin 53538
(800) 563004 or (920) 563-2963
A family-owned and -operated business that is more than a century old, Jones Dairy Farm was established in Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin, in 1889. The current president and sixth generation owner, Philip Jones, went to Paris for his culinary expertise and worked as an executive chef for thirteen years before his relatives would allow him to even think about coming home to work in the family business. Jones Dairy Farm makes a pure cherrywood-smoked bacon that has a perfectly balanced salty, sweet, smoky flavor and is wonderful served with eggs for breakfast or when making our Paella with Chicken and Bacon (
page 146
). Its regular thinner-cut bacon is also good for making our Crusted Salmon with Avocado and Red Onion Green Salad (
page 159
) or delicious in our Rum Ice Cream with Candied Bacon Chips (
page 281
). Jones Dairy Farm sells its bacon in such specialty food shops as Harris Teeter and Wegmans and through its website.
Nature’s Promise
Stop & Shop
(800) 767-7772
Uncured hickory-smoked bacon—no antibiotics, no hormones, no nitrates, no growth stimulants or added hormones, no preservatives, and vegetarian fed with no animal by-products: That’s a lot of nos and we like that. Nature’s Promise is the organic house brand for Stop & Shop. Like a number of supermarket chains around the country, Stop & Shop has started to offer organic food. Three cheers! Nature’s Promise is a little more thinly sliced than other artisanal bacons. Four slices produced about two tablespoons of bacon fat. It fries up with a lovely mix of sweet-salty-smoky flavors. Use it as an everyday bacon or in the Sweet Potato Pancakes with Bacon (
page 219
); Non-Suffering Succotash (
page 215
); or Frittata with Asparagus, Shallots, and Bacon (
page 260
).
Niman Ranch
1600 Harbor Bay Parkway
Suite 250
Alameda, California 94502
(510) 808-0340
“We let pigs be pigs” is the simple philosophy of Paul Willis, founder of Niman Ranch. Among devotees of sustainably, humanely raised pigs and of pork farmer-owned cooperatives, Niman Ranch is known as the industry leader. It produces truly beautiful bacon. Thick-sliced, both cured and uncured, the bacon from free-range animals has really good-tasting fat, and because the meat comes from well-exercised animals it also has more flavor than the average bacon. This is what farm-raised bacon tasted like fifty years ago—simple, to the point, and fabulous. We found this bacon to work in so many of our recipes. You will like it with Chicken Tagine with Bacon, Butternut Squash, and Prunes (
page 136
), Chicken Marsala with Bacon and Sage (
page 138
), or our Chocolate-Peanut-Bacon Toffee (
page 277
).
Many Whole Foods Markets and specialty food shops all across the country stock Niman Ranch products, which are also available through its website.
Smokehouse of the Catskills
724 Route 212
Saugerties, New York 12477
(845) 246-8767
We’ve been patronizing this Catskill institution just outside Saugerties, New York, for years. Smokehouse of the Catskills’ double-smoked bacon has a beautiful color, a good proportion of meat to fat, and killer flavor. We asked the owner what the secret of double smoking is and his answer was as instructive as a politician’s when he wants to duck a question about a former mistress. Oh well, what did we expect? The point is, if you ever drive by a smokehouse, stop in and check it out. You may find some great bacon as well as sausages and other smoked meats that you’ve never tried before.
By the way, Saugerties is the town where the house known as Big Pink is, made famous by The Band in
Music from Big Pink
, revered by music aficionados as one of the two or three great albums of the rock-and-roll era. Don’t limit yourself to our choices, but Smokehouse of the Catskills’ bacon worked for us when we tested Bacon and Butternut Squash Galette (
page 43
) and Nuevos Huevos Rancheros (
page 250
).
S. Wallace Edwards & Sons, Inc.
P.O. Box 25
Surry, Virginia 23883
(800) 222-4267
Affable Sam Edwards is a poster boy for sustainable American products. He uses only heritage breeds and says he can’t get enough of them, completely selling out all the bacon he makes. He produces three different bacons: hickory smoked; pepper coated; and brown sugar, cinnamon, and apple rubbed. According to Sam his bacon loses about 10 percent of its weight after curing, giving it a more intense flavor and a more stable shelf life. Sam adds that chefs really like using his bacon with poultry and fish dishes. We liked his bacon in Flaky Cod Fillets with Bacon and Wine-Braised Fennel (
page 156
).
Swiss Meat & Sausage Co.
2056 South Highway 19
Hermann, Missouri 65041
(800) 793-7947
The four Sloan sisters are justly proud of their bacon recipe, which was handed down from their parents, Bill and Margie. Their hickory wood-smoked bacon is sugar cured, hardwood smoked, and tumbler dried to tenderize and season it. We’ve tasted Swiss Meat & Sausage Co.’s very good pepper-rubbed, honey-cured, and cinnamon- and applewood-smoked bacons, as well as their cottage bacon, made from a boneless pork shoulder, which tastes something like English or Canadian bacon. Try the hickorywood-smoked bacon with Bacon, Grits, and Leek Soufflé (
page 256
) or the cinnamon and applewood-smoked bacon with French Toast Bread Pudding with Bacon and Cinnamon (
page 262
).
Thielen Meats of Pierz
310 North Main Street
Pierz, Minnesota 56364
(877) 377-6256 or (320) 468-6616
A family business since 1922, Thielen Meats works with pork bellies that are leaner than those many producers use, resulting in an exceptionally high ratio of meat to fat. Thielen Meats clings to a traditional long-smoking recipe, which is almost double the hours of present-day methods and produces a very smoky bacon. Breathe in the aroma when you open the package. It smells like a campfire the morning after.
We tested our Spiced Nuts with Bacon (
page 22
) with Thielen Meats’ bacon. The high meat-to-fat ratio produced bite-size nuggets with just the right amount of mouth-filling crunch to go with the nuts. But don’t expect much fat when the bacon is fried; this is a bacon that presents itself when cooked like small, thin pieces of delicious smoked ham. For one of its specialty bacons, Thielen Meats uses minced garlic in the marinating and curing process and then leaves the garlic sitting on the bacon while it smokes. It’s delicious and mighty powerful, but you need to be a garlic lover. We used it to sauté broccoli rabe and onions for a quick tomatoless pasta sauce and it was also lean but superb in our Osso Buco with Orange and Lemon Gremolata (
page 110
).
Thielen Meats’ bacon is not available online but you can call directly and someone will take your order and explain the shipping and handling policy.
Vande Rose Farms
P.O. Box 160
305 Main Street, Suite #1
Iowa Falls, Iowa 50126
(866) 522-4448
We have only good things to say about Vande Rose Farms’ great bacon, definitely one of our favorites. With its deep, vibrant reddish-brown color this bacon proudly wears its old-fashioned brown sugar cure and applewood smoke. Equally old-fashioned, the heritage-breed Duroc hogs are raised without growth hormones, antibiotics, or phosphates. The bacon has a nice proportion of meat to fat and there is minimal shrinkage when cooked. Three slices yielded 3 tablespoons of bacon fat and still left us with generously thick slices. It hit the spot with Linguine with Fresh Clams, Bacon, and Basil (and a Touch of Cream) (
page 193
) and our Bacon Bread Crumbs (
page 224
).
Granted, it’s not the cheapest bacon, but it’s worth every penny. Unless you live in Iowa, where Vande Rose Farms sells its bacon at Hy-Vee stores, you can only purchase it through the website.
Vermont Smoke and Cure
P.O. Box 278
South Barre, Vermont
(802) 476-4666
We tested our Bacon-Flavored Stock (
page 54
) and our Slow-Cooker Pulled Bacon and Bourbon Beans (
page 198
) with the wonderful Vermont Smoke and Cure slab bacon, which is brined in Vermont maple syrup and smoked using corncobs and maplewood. It is not overly salty and has a slight sweetness from the Vermont maple syrup brine. The company is committed to the local farming industry and buys its hogs, syrup, and wood for smoking from Vermont suppliers. We found Vermont Smoke and Cure bacon, made from certified humanely raised hogs, at Whole Foods. It’s sold in the Boston area at Roche Bros., but it’s also available by mail order online.
Zingerman’s
422 Detroit Street
Ann Arbor, Michigan 48104
(888) 636-8162
Zingerman’s is probably the best mail-order house for the full range of artisanal, sustainable, and every other good thing you can think of in terms of food. If you are looking for an easy way to try some of the best bacons, Zingerman’s Bacon Club is the place to start.
Zingerman’s Guide to Better Bacon
by Zingerman’s founder Ari Weinzweig is a super introduction to baconology. In addition to his own book, Weinzweig also sells the completely charming, authoritative, and wacky
Adventures of a Bacon Curer
by Maynard Davies.
About the Authors
Peter Kaminsky’s most recent book is
Culinary Intelligence
. His other books include
Pig Perfect: Encounters with Remarkable Swine and Some Great Ways to Cook Them, Seven Fires
(with Francis Mallmann),
The Elements of Taste
(with Gray Kunz), and
Charred & Scruffed
(with Adam Perry Lang).
