Happy International Bacon Day

I've been feeling bad that I just haven't updated this blog in a few weeks, but I just haven't cooked or eaten anything blog worthy. Definitely had some good things to eat, but nothing to write home about (no pun intended). Then I went out for drinks tonight with my friend JR and he was asking if I had blogged anything lately. Then I come home and see something on Facebook about International Bacon Day. I followed the link to and found out that in the United States, International Bacon Day, is celebrated on the Saturday before Labor Day, or today (no explanation why it was listed as United States specific, shouldn't it be International Bacon Day everywhere, or American Bacon Day). Regardless it got me thinking about bacon. Interestingly, despite all advances in healthy eating, bacon which is considered one of the most unhealthy foods, is increasing in popularity. I mean everywhere you hear ads with bacon this bacon that. So in honor of today's holiday, I wanted to talk about bacon a bit.

1) My favorite bacon in the world is from Whole Foods. Weekend mornings they do a breakfast spread that has all the bacon you could want. Thick cut, a great maple flavor, and cooked well. Bacon is one of the foods that people tend to have strong feelings towards how it is cooked. Some like it black and crumbly, some prefer white and chewy. I like mine very much in the middle, mostly because I like my bacon to be a piece of meat and cooked as it were any other protein, to completion, but not dried out and overdone. Whole Foods cooks their perfectly to my standards.

2) During a weekend of partying in San Diego a few years ago, we woke up all kinds of hung over. The only things we could find to eat were a bowl of candy (fun sized Snickers and Hershey Bars and such) and a package of bacon. So as the bacon was cooking, the candy was eaten. Once the bacon was cooked, the bacon was eaten, but it just wasn't doing the trick. You can only guess where this turned. Snickers wrapped in bacon. Meh. Crunch bars with crunchy bacon. So-so. But then. Then we found the Kit-Kats. If they are the Kat, then the bacon was the Kat's meow. The crunchy wafers, the soft chocolate (hot greasy bacon melts milk chocolate, duh). The sweet cocoa and the salty meat. By this point most people are probably gagging (I know this photos or links to this on Google were impossible to find), but until the day I die, I will recommend people to try this. Just awesome.

3) When I first started to really cook for myself on a regular basis, about two years ago, I came across this recipe on the internet. Since then I have yet to find a group of people (most likely guys) that are ballsy enough to try the Bacon Explosion. Its gotta be people that are just like to hell with it. I know that this is totally bad for me, but at the same time I am an adventurous enough eater to try this crazy thing. So what is it? You start by taking a pound of raw bacon weaving it into a bacon quilt and then seasoning it. Then you take 2 lbs of raw Italian Sausage and make a layer on top of your seasoned bacon quilt. Then a pound of crumbled bacon on top of the sausage and add some BBQ sauce. Roll it all together and cook it. Glaze with BBQ sauce once you've taken it out of the cooker. Eat it however you want or slice and serve on top of a biscuits. I have to say what I can write about this dish really doesn't do it justice. Clink on the link (here it is again) to see photos, a much better recipe, or if you want you can buy whole and half logs ($29.99 and $17.99, respectively, a bit less than I would have expected).

While doing some research for this post I came across another food blog, This Is Why You're Fat, completely horrible foods that you can't begin to wonder about the mindset of whom ever created them.

So to celebrate International Bacon Day eat some bacon, turkey bacon, soy bacon, whatever kind of bacon you want in whatever kind of you want. And for god sakes, if you find and Raccoon Bacon get me some.

Dream Pizza

A few weeks ago I woke up and was like whoa. I just made a pizza in my mind and it was awesome. So over the past couple weeks I kept tweaking the recipe in my head and here is what I came up with. I am not going to say it was the best pizza ever or my favorite pizza ever its simply called Dream because it came to me in a dream.

Started off by cutting some chicken breasts into bite sized cubes. I cooked these in a pan with some balsamic vinaigrette dressing. While this was cooking off I took a package of whole wheat biscuit dough and rolled it out in a size for the pan. In the past when I've made pizza using the store bought dough it hasn't been very flavorful. I know I could make dough from scratch, but who has the time for that. To try and flavor it I brushed it with olive oil and then sprinkled minced garlic, basil, oregano, and parmesan cheese on top. I was trying to make it focaccia like. And damn I just realized that I should have added some rosemary. Next time.

So I spread the chicken evenly over the dough. To Holly's half I added mushrooms, to mine I added kalamata olives. Then artichoke heart pieces to everything and some tomato and basil feta cheese. Drizzled it all with balsamic vinegar and threw it in the oven for about twenty minutes.

The pizza came out looking great, but got mixed reviews taste wise. The crust wasn't cooked before toppings were added so it came out not very focaccia like. Also the seasonings that I had added to the crust ended up getting a bit lost with the toppings and didn't add much flavor to the crust. I think what I may need to next time is mix a ton of spices into the dough itself so that it ends up tasting delicious and not like a bland biscuit flavored pizza dough. Toppings on the pizza came out well. The complemented each other nicely and I don't think I would change much to it. And it certainly lived up to its expectations that I mentioned in my dream. Not the best or favorite, but hits a ton of different flavors I was looking to combine.

If you've never made pizza at home it is really a great thing to do. You get a lot for a little amount of money and can be creative as you want. Taco meat and aspargus? Sure. Kit kat and bacon for seconds? Its your house no one will judge you (actually kit kats and bacon are a great combo by them self, just not sure how to incorporate it into a pizza). So have fun with it and if you figure out a good way to make the crust I'd love to hear about it.

NOLA Brewery Tour

New Orleans used to be one of the biggest beer brewing areas in the South. But over the past century or so a city which has made a name for itself due to alcohol fueled debauchery, has lost all of its taste for good beer. You certainly can't blame the city entirely as for most of the 20th century Americans equated beer to the watery American Standard Lagers put out by Budweiser, Miller, or Coors. In the 1970's new legislation allowed a beer revolution that allowed craft beers to pop up all over the country. That being said New Orleans didn't have a craft brewery until last year. Yes, Abita is brewed not too far away in Abita Springs, LA, but nothing was brewed in the city of New Orleans. In January 2009 NOLA Brewing Company opened their doors and by that March were shipping beers throughout New Orleans. At first they had two varieties: Brown and Blonde. Now they have added a pale ale (Hopitoulas), a seasonal ale (Hurricane Saison), and 7th Street Lemon Basil Wheat to their repertoire. And in the fall they will be rolling out their sixth offering Irish Channel Stout.

So the reason I am talking about NOLA Brewing Co. is that every Friday at 2 pm they offer a tour. Its not publicized anywhere, you just have to know about it or email the company (though I guess by reading this blog you know now). No reservations or a fee, just show up and take a tour. So we started off getting a glass and getting it filled with NOLA Blonde. As we were drinking that we walked around learning about the brewery and their equipment. Then they walked us to the other side of the brewery (which was really just a room) and got to try the Brown Ale, the Hopitoulas, and the 7th Street Wheat. While we were there the first bottle of NOLA beer was bottled. Because the machinery to mass produce bottled beer is so expensive, NOLA has specifically been sold as a draft beer. In mid-September NOLA is headed to the Great American Beer Festival, the premier beer competition in the country, so they needed to have some bottles to bring with them.

At this point the tour was more or less over, but they certainly weren't anxious to kick us out. Myself as well as a number of other beer enthusiasts stood around and talked about beer. At first our tour leader kept refilling our glasses, but at one point he had to go back to work and told us to walk around the building helping ourselves to whatever tap we wanted. Overall I had 3 pints, but some of the other people I was with (clearly the ones not driving) had 6 or 8. And the best part? Its all free. Because of something called the three-tiered system breweries (with the exception of brew pubs) are not allowed to sell beer directly to consumers. Basically it must go from the brewery to a distributor who sells to bars or liquor stores or wherever the end consumer chooses to buy beer. At one point the owner of the brewery came out and started talking with us. Just a bunch of beer people drinking and talking. Finally a bunch of the people I was on the tour with decided to head across town to the New Orleans rum distillery for their tour. I thought about going because we were all having a great time, but opted out knowing I couldn't spend a few more hours drinking and still drive home. So I bought a pint glass (how could I not at my first brewery tour?) and headed off into the sunset.

Oh and by the way NOLA Brewing Co. had a special cask of 7th Street Watermelon Wheat that they were tapping at Avenue Pub (they do this every few weeks) and all the people from the tour were headed over there for that.

Crab Cakes and Football...THAT'S WHAT LOUISIANA DOES

Made crab cakes and wild pecan brown rice. Had some remoulade to top the crab cakes off obviously. Baked instead of fried and used imitation crab meat to save money and some calories. Came out awesome

Get Me To the Greek

One night back in March, Holly said she wanted to go out for dinner. I told her to pick a place, but once she did she wouldn't tell me where we were going, convinced that I wouldn't want to go for "that" type of food whatever "that" was. Well eventually we got there and it was a place called Mediterranean Cafe. Her apprehension to telling me where we were going was certainly warranted since I never ate much ethnic food and I am not always eager to try those kinds of things. Well once we were there I had to roll with it and realized that falafel and gyros were actually really good. Since then we've tried other restaurants and they weren't quite as good. Well recently I've had a craving for Greek food and was like to hell with it rather than go out and pay almost $35 for the two of us to eat food that is probably really bad for us, why don't I just make it myself. So within 6 months I went from not willing to try something to making it myself. So last nights menu was Chicken Souvlaki with peppers and onions, pita bread, rice, tzatziki sauce, and yogurt with honey and toasted walnuts for dessert. I know it sounds like a lot and that ethnic cooking can be strange to attempt (have you ever cooked Chinese or Indian food at home? no its easier to just get takeout), but with a little preparation this meal can be went from raw to cooked in 15 minutes.

Chicken Souvlaki (could use lamb or beef if you wanted):
Mix up a little bit of oregano, thyme, rosemary, olive oil, and garlic in a bag. Add the meat and let it marinate in the fridge for as long as you want. Broil skewers on hi for about 10 minutes. Also add some green pepper and onion chunks to the skewers before cooking to give your meal a bit more substance.

Before I get into how to make the tzatziki, I want to talk about one of its main ingedients, yogurt cheese. No its not cheddar or swiss flavored yogurt. Its where you drain the whey liquid out of nonfat plain yogurt. The longer you let it sit, the more whey that drains out and the thicker consistency it gets. I took a coffee filter and put it inside of funnel. Fill it with the non-fat plain yogurt and sit it on top of a large cup. Sit it in your fridge and let it drain. Drain for 6-8 hours and you have sour cream consistency, 24 hours will give you cream cheese. The idea is to give you a healthier substitute for high fat creamy products. It will also take on the flavor of other things so can used to make healthier versions of mayo, peanut butter, whipped cream, ice cream, chocolate mousse, or vanilla frosting. Look on the internet and you can find plenty of ideas of what you can do with yogurt cheese. Look through a diet cookbook and you will find recipe after recipe that utilizes it.

So on with the Tzatziki:
Grate a half of a peeled and seeded cucumber, then pour off the excess liquid from the bowl. Add some dill, lemon juice, olive oil, a bunch of garlic, and about a cup of yogurt cheese that has drained for 2-4 hours. Mix all together and let sit in the fridge until your ready to eat. The longer the flavors sit together the better the sauce is supposed to get.

Serve the meat skewers and tzatziki with rice, warmed pita breads, and maybe some katalamata olives. As an alternative to meat and rice, you can make this as a vegetarian option, use quinoia a grain that is an excellent source of protein.

Yogurt with honey and toasted walnuts:
Toasted a few walnuts halves and pieces in the toaster oven and then cool it. Take a scoop of yogurt cheese (again 2-4 hour draining) top it with the walnuts and some honey.


It was unbelievable to us that it was possible to make such a delicious dinner so quickly. You just have to make sure that you drain the yogurt in advance, otherwise the meal won't be complete until about 10 o'clock at night. Enjoy.

I'm Addicted to Smoking...Cough Cough

Last summer Holly decided that she was finally going to buy a smoker. She wanted one for years and bought a small Brinkman one. Not big enough for a large party, but certainly good for us and maybe a few friends. Since we got it last summer, it has pretty much sat under a cover in the backyard save for the one time I cured it. Part was that I was lazy and unmotivated knowing that it would take awhile and it was either hot or cold, but really I was just scared. It just seemed like such a daunting task. Why not just make chicken or ribs on the grill. Takes a lot less time, is a lot easier to not mess up, and its gotta taste similar right. WRONG. WRONG, WRONG, WRONG, WRONG, WRONG, WRONG, WRONG.

Today I finally got to it. Defrosted some ribs I had in the freezer and had some chicken breasts that I bought yesterday. Put some Squeal Hog Rub on top of it and got to the fire. Apparently I couldn't really channel much from my old Boy Scout days. I remembered that I need a paper starter, kindling and wood, but how much? And how quickly did I have to add them. So I lit it and it went out. I lit it again, same result. I spent much of the next hour and forty five minutes doing this over and over. Whittling at oak and hickory logs. Sawing them. Using mesquite chips. Paper. Cardboard. Basically anything I could do to light a fire. I was almost ready to start channeling my inner Native American and doing a fire dance. Finally the two BBQ lighters that I had were on their last drops of fluid and I was almost ready to fire up the grill when I did the last resort. Everything I read said that if you use lighter fluid, your food may end up tasting like chemicals. It was a gamble, but I was at a smoke or bust situation. Well that got it going. A little smelly, but we had a good sustained flame.

On goes the meat. Everything I read said internal temps of about 160 degrees or 2-3 hours. Thats useful. I struggle to grill many meats without having to cut them open to ensure they are done. How many times have I taken something to the cutting board only to have to go back and re-fire the grill and throw things back on. So I spent the next hour running back and forth from my work shop to the smoker making and then tossing in little pieces of wood. It got to the point where I pulled out my electric jig saw to try and cut quicker. Eventually it turned out that a hatchet is really the best way to split logs. In retrospect probably should have had more than athletic shorts and flip flops on. So I get the fire to the good point and Holly tells me she wants to go check out a couch someone is selling. Challenge. Is my fire good enough to survive a little bit of me going away. Real BBQ pits can be set and not touched for hours, but due to my inexperience and the small size of the smoker not allowing me to put bigger pieces of wood in, I had been putting things in every few minutes.

So we go (don't get the couch) and are back in about fifteen minutes but by that point the fire is out, just a pile of ashes and smoldering coals. Well the food looked like it was almost drying out, but it had only been cooking for a little over an hour, and if you consider time it was at a proper heat, even less. A little lighter fluid didn't really do much. I put some various pieces of wood in and no go, so I head inside a bit to grab a drink and a meat thermometer to see if I've got the 160 yet, and to my surprise I come back and see a nice little fire. Apparently I just need a bit more time and patience. So I keep stoking it and watching the thermometer, but not seeing numbers I liked. I relaxed and just waited and hoped. Finally I decided it was time to grab a knife and cut in to things a little. I grabbed the thickest cut of chicken and it was juicy, but fully cooked. I grabbed a rib and there was a beautiful smoke ring. Did they turn out right? Would we taste the little bits of ash that landed on top of the meat? Is it going to taste like lighter fluid? Only time would tell.

So we grabbed some margaritas and bbq sauce (Stubbs Honey Pecan and Sweet Baby Ray's Hickory and Brown Sugar). Sweet Baby Ray's is always a hit, but the Stubbs is interesting. I've had their Spicy and Moppin' Sauces, but their Honey Pecan is interesting. At first we didn't like it, it almost has an Asian taste, but it worked with tonight's food. So we each grab some stuff. The ribs looked very juicy as if they had sat in sauce for hours (but hadn't had any whatsoever), but the chicken seemed to be very tough and dry. But then we cut into it and tried it. The smoke flavor was as if we were eating logs. The chicken just fell apart with how tender it was. The dryness was actually just the bark and kept the inside of it meat flavorful and moist. And the ribs. The outside had a nice bark from the rub. A pink smoke ring on the outside and some perfectly cooked pork in the middle. Ribs with little fat and even less bones and tons of meat. I've never had any BBQ that has been like this. And do I look like the kind of guy that would be unsure of something like this? I mean I have a freaking "I heart BBQ" t-shirt. I stopped eating a few hours ago and my hands still smell like smoky meat, my clothes smell like I sat in a campfire, and my lips continue have a salty smoky taste. I wouldn't say I'm a "pit master" yet, but I am excited to start to play around with the hundreds of combination in a smoker. Maybe some day Bobby Flay will challenge me to a Throwdown.

Happy Hour

Tonight one of Holly's work clients threw a little appreciation party at a restaurant. I don't work for the company, but other spouses were going and lets be honest I'm not one to pass on half priced appetizers and free drinks.

We got there about half way through happy hour, and by that point all the other people already had several appetizers (or at least whatever they hadn't gotten to yet) in front of them. Everything looked really good. Standard bar appetizer fare, but it all looked awesome. We ordered fried calamari, tangy boneless chicken wings, and chili cheese waffle fries. Again it all looked and smelled great. Problem was once we started eating it was just so mediocre. Calamari was ok, bit too much batter, not enough meat. Wings had a great looking sauce, but none of the flavors in it were strong enough to even be distinguishable. Chili on the fries was merely canned chili doctored up with some sauteed onions and jalapenos.

The purpose of this blog post was when the check came. What is the etiquette on tipping during happy hour. Generally if you use a gift card or coupon or other discount you still tip on full value of the check, but that is when you choose to not pay a full price. But what about when the restaurant is offering the discount? Are you expected to know what your bill should have been and tip on that or should you assume that the establishment is making sure their servers are properly compensated? Our bill which in addition to the food, included three well mixed drinks, a soda and a water came to about $14 (free booze, but they charged us $2 for a plain diet coke--huh?). I know that the value of our stuff should have been more than that, but there was no prices listed anywhere for the liquor, so how can we even know the value. I could have seen them costing $4 a piece, but also could have seen them being $7 or $8. And to top it all off the waitress was either quite bad at her job, or she just didn't care about doing well for a big party not expecting tips from partial checks and was just not trying. End of the story, is if she did a great job, there is an argument to be made for a decent tip...but she didn't.