Bacon Bacon Bacon

      Everyone knows that bacon makes everything better. A cheeseburger is good, but make it a bacon cheeseburger and it's even better. A breakfast staple is bacon & eggs, because who has just eggs? I like a steak, but wrap it in bacon and it becomes a little piece of tender heaven. We even have the B.L.T. (the B does not stand for bread), and add bacon bits to salad (mmm...Caesar Salad). But what is bacon, and why all the hype about it suddenly?

      Bacon is a special product that comes from a "wonderful, magical animal" (Simpson, Homer) and I think there has always been hype about bacon. However, I have noticed there are more bacon novelty items on the market then there used to be. I love Bacon and chocolate, but I'm not sure how I feel about bacon beverages, like Maple Bacon Ale, or bacon bandages (probably not flavoured?). So, because of my love for bacon I decided to see how many items in one meal that I could add bacon to. The answer was 3, I could have added it to more items, but I then I got to thinking about my heart, and despite how much I love bacon, I didn't think my heart would appreciate the bacon as much as my taste buds.

Bacon, Bacon, and More Bacon

Here was my menu


Appetizer: Bacon Wrapped Avocado

Entree: Bacon Wrapped Chicken Drumstick, with steamed garlic broccoli (I thought about doing bacon mashed potatoes, but decided that would be too heavy for the meal and went with something lighter).

Dessert: Candied Bacon



I cooked all the items together on a rack in the oven, and as they were finished, I took them out and kept them warm. You could do them each on a different pan and have them all ready at the same time.

So, here's how you do it

Bacon Wrapped Avocado

4-6 Strips of Bacon, cut in half
1 Avocado, peeled and cut into 8-12 wedges (it depends on how big your avocado is, and how much you want in each wrap)
1/4 to 1/3 Cup Brown Sugar (depending on how sweet you'd like it)
1 Teaspoon Chili Powder (or less depending on how spicy you'd like it)


1. Heat the oven to 425°F (I baked them at 400°F).

2. In a small bowl, mix together the brown sugar and chili powder. Set aside

3. Line a baking pan with tinfoil and place a roasting rack on top.


4. Cut open the avocado and remove the pit. Slice lengthwise through the avocado, approximately 8-12 slices.

5. Wrap each piece of cut bacon around the avocado wedge. Roll in the brown sugar/chili mixture and place on the baking rack.

6. Bake for 10-20 minutes. Remove from the oven to a platter and stick a tooth pick in each for serving.


Bacon Wrapped Chicken Drumstick

1/2 a lemon, juiced
2 garlic cloves, crushed
   chicken seasoning (I used thyme and oregano)
6 chicken drumsticks
6 pieces of bacon


1. Heat oven to 400°F.

2. Mix together the lemon juice and garlic with some seasoning. Set aside.

3. Prick the chicken several times with a sharp knife and drizzle with half the garlicky lemon juice.

4. Wrap each drumstick with one piece of bacon and put in a single layer on the rack on your baking pan.

5. Drizzle on the remaining garlic-lemon juice.

6. Cook for 45-50 mins until the chicken is cooked through and the bacon is starting to crisp up. Flash under a hot grill if you like your bacon really crisp.


Candied Bacon

6 slices bacon
Finely ground black pepper
1/4 cup light brown sugar


1. Preheat the oven to 325 °F (I baked them at 400°F and they were fine, I just baked them for a shorter time)

2. Put bacon slices in a bowl, season them with pepper and toss with the brown sugar. Cover a baking sheet with parchment or foil with a roasting rack on top. Arrange the bacon in a single layer and sprinkle any sugar left in the bowl over the bacon. If you want, you can top with another layer of parchment or foil and top it, squarely, with another baking sheet that will flatten the bacon as it cooks, but I didn't have a problem.

3. Place the tray in the center of the oven and bake for 20 minutes. Check the bacon, and if it is not golden brown and fairly crispy, cook it for 10 to 15 minutes longer. Check it again. Keep in mind that when you remove the tray and transfer the bacon to a serving platter or individual plates, the bacon will "crisp" up a little more.

4. Let cool before serving.



      Cooking bacon in the oven on a roasting rack elevates it from the grease that drips out, but careful, it dries out a little faster, but it isn't being fried in fat. We also greatly enjoy baking a bacon weave. It's perfect for B.L.T.s because every bite can have bacon. To do this, cut 6 pieces of bacon in half, and basket weave them into 2 squares.

"Is it Bacon Day?" (Simpson, Homer)


                                                                                                                                                       Enjoy!
                                                                                                                                                           Mel

 P.S. It's not yet Bacon Day, you'll have to wait until August 31, 2013 for that!

Thanks to The Royal Bacon Society for the quotes.

Real Canadian Chicken

           We're a little chicken over here in the Peppery Pig household. Not scared or nervous, but full of poultry. Mr. Pepper loves to have leftover chicken on hand, which is why I feel like we're always eating chicken, be it for lunch or for dinner (and as I type I have chicken in the oven). Sometimes we'll roast a full chicken in the oven (once our barbecues reopen, we will resume roasting our beer-butt chickens on the grill), sometimes we do thighs, sometimes drumsticks, sometimes breasts. We base our decision about what part of the bird we'll eat on our weekly needs/menu. When roasting a whole chicken, we'll each eat about a quarter of the bird, leaving the remainder for sandwiches/wraps/salads for lunch. When doing breasts, thighs or drumsticks, we'll double what we need for dinner so we can have leftovers for lunch with sides the next day.

           However, because we eat so much chicken, I was finding that I was getting so bored of having the same old thing, so I began hunting for new and unique recipes that would change up the flavours. Now, don't get me wrong, I still love shake-n-bake drumsticks, and BBQ chicken thighs, but sometimes, you just need to spice things up. It really makes you appreciate those delicate flavours found in that box of shake-n-bake (ha). I should also mention here that I am working really hard to avoid processed/boxed foods and spice mixes because they are full of sodium and unpronounceable ingredients (I probably shouldn't mention that those are Jane's chicken strips in the oven? Don't judge, they were in the freezer). I digress, on my hunt to find new and exciting flavours, I stumbled across the one I am about to share. This recipe is unique because it combines some ingredients that one wouldn't necessarily think to use together. I call it Real Canadian Chicken because of its use of real Maple Syrup. It's a sweet, tangy chicken that is fantastic in a sandwich/wrap the next day with some avocado. It's an easy recipe to whip up ahead of time, and  best of all, it can all be done in one dish (if you'd like).

Here's what you need:

Mustard Seeds soaked in Whiskey

1/4 cup pure maple syrup
3 tbsp grainy Dijon mustard (I used a combination of Kozlik's 'Triple Crunch au Rye Triple Sec' and French's Prepared Dijon with Chardonnay)
2 tbsp minced fresh dill (or 2 tsp dried)
2 tbsp fresh squeezed lemon juice
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
2 tsp grated lemon zest (zest your lemon before you squeeze it)
1 tsp minced garlic (about 2 cloves)
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp fresh ground black pepper
4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts (about 1 1/2 lbs)

Here's what you do:

Marinade

1. Whisk together maple syrup, mustard, dill, lemon juice, olive oil, balsamic vinegar, zest, garlic, salt and pepper in a small bowl or in a casserole dish that is just large enough to hold your 4 chicken breasts so they aren't overlapping.  You don't want one that's too big because your marinade will spread too thin and will most likely burn in the oven.






2. Arrange the chicken in the casserole dish and pour the marinade over the chicken. Flip the chicken to coat both sides. (If you mixed the marinade in your casserole dish, just be sure to coat the chicken well.)

3. Cover with plastic wrap or a lid and refrigerate for at least 1 hour, or up to 1 day.




4. Preheat oven to 350°F. Remove plastic wrap/lid and transfer casserole dish to the middle oven rack. Bake, uncovered, for about 35 minutes, or until chicken is no longer pink in the centre.


5. Place cooked chicken on a serving platter and keep warm. Pour juices and marinade from the casserole dish into a small saucepan. Bring to a boil over high heat until mixture reduces by half. Pour sauce over chicken and serve immediately.

       This is such a good recipe, and it makes enough marinade that if you want to add 2 more chicken breasts to the dish, you can without having to alter the ingredients, you just won't have as much marinade left to turn into the sauce. When we made our wraps/sandwiches the next day, I used the sauce as a spread on the bread. It was delicious. The other nice thing about this recipe is that you can alter it to fit your family's likes/dislikes. Don't like sweet meats? Don't add as much maple syrup. Not a fan of Dijon? Add less or combine different mustards (I'm not a fan, hence the combination). Have fun with the recipe.

                                                                                                                                                     Enjoy!
                                                                                                                                                         Mel

Makes 4 servings
per serving: 289 Calories, 6.4g total fat (1.1g sat fat), 40g protein, 16g carbohydrate, 0.4g fiber, 99mg cholesterol, 322mg sodium