Bacon hacks

"Hacking" isn't just for computers--anytime someone gets a hankering to alter a sign, billboard, placard or other public message by adding their own twisted bent on it. Sometimes, those hackers turn their thoughts to bacon:

Have you seen any bacon hacks? Perpetrated your own? If so, please send 'em along to the Head Lab Tech at BDJLabs_AT gmail_DOT com.

Bacon Bad: Nightline report on bacon has no sizzle

I guess Nightline gets points for trying, but not many, because they didn't try to hard in their report on the bacon craze. One, they're very, very late in jumping on the bandwagon. Two, no one in the bacon "community" knows who this jackass is. Three, it features very little in the way of information--nothing about restaurants featuring bacon, no discussion with bacon makers, nada about events like BaconFest Chicago. Four, they disparage the fabulous bacon products from Archie McPhee, and we just can't tolerate that. We could go on, but we'll just let you watch this POS clip and judge for yourselves. Because Hulu's embed feature is totally frakked, you're going to have to click here to peep that mess.

Happy Birthday, Twinkie!

Today marks the 80th birthday of one of America's finest snack foods. Sure, they have a chemical makeup that enables them to survive decades on the shelf, and possibly endure a nuclear holocaust, but still--hard to resist the spongey sponge cake and the insanely sweet creme inside. The Twinkie was created way back in 1930 in Chicago, our hometown. Much has changed about the country since then--desegregation, television, computers, and whatnot--but our beloved artery clogger remains constant.

The Twinkie was one of the firsts bacon tests we recorded on BDJ--click here for a trip in the Wayback Machine.

Test #207: Bacon and PAPAYA

The subject

While American palettes are becoming ever more diverse, there's still sadly millions of people who don't venture outside a few dozen varieties of food or veggies at their local produce purveyor. Mango, papaya, pomegranate--these fairly common fruits are still just weird candy flavors to most Yankees. Sad--not only are these sweet treasures insanely delicious, they're also EVERYWHERE. You can find mango even at the most whitebread of supermarkets, and if you're willing to go to just a tiny bit of trouble, you can partake of the wonder that is a fresh papaya--which is what we at BDJ Labs did for our recent test. We broke into a succulent fruit and went crazy, but before the papaya was gone, we wrapped a few pieces in bacon.

The results
Yummy--the papaya didn't get too terribly squishy, and only took on a little baconness, so the taste bit remained complex and didn't turn into a homogenous blob.  Still, we think papaya is just fine on its own--not many things are great with bacon and even better solo. This is one of them.

The conclusion: Bacon + papaya = fabuloso

BDJ Under Construction

Bacon Du Jour is going under a facelift. If we were a fancy-ass big company, or had any Web budget whatsoever, we'd take hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars and pour those resources into crafting a stunningly beautiful, technologically genius piece of blogging art, launching the facelifted site with much fanfare. However, because we have no skillz and prefer to spend our money on bacon procurement, you're going to see gradual, less-than-awe-inspiring changes over the next few weeks. The design is part of it (see the banner--we're still working on it), but there's WAY more in the features/programming department, which we're more excited about than the superficial looky-look stuff:

• MORE mad bacon experiments
• EXCITING bacon-themed videos and vlogs
• THRILLING stories about bacon and the people that love it
• TANTALIZING bacon recipes from around the globe
• INSPIRING stories from baconeers

Thank you for reading. We love you. No, really--we mean it.

BREAKIN' BACON: Bacon Baby bacon-flavored formula

The genius-pants guys at Bacon Salt have done it again--this time, a nutritious, delicious way to indoctrinate your recently-birthed spawn into the brother(or sister)hood of salted-pork appreciation. You might be tempted to hit the bottle yourself, just so you, too, can enjoy the sumptuous bacony goodness of this life-giving nectar.

If you'd like to get your little tyke sucking down bacon-flavored formula, you'd better act quickly. I hear from Bacon Salt Headquarters that supplies are extremely limited. If you love your baby, you'll waste not another second and click here IMMEDIATELY to get your formula.

My First Bacon

Ahead of next week's revamping of Bacon Du Jour, please enjoy this fabulous bacon-product from our friends at ThinkGeek....