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where to get great bacon?


glenn

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I just had some of the best bacon (if not the best) this past Sunday from Flying Pigs Farm in Shushan, N.Y. All their pork is from heritage breeds.

John Sconzo, M.D. aka "docsconz"

"Remember that a very good sardine is always preferable to a not that good lobster."

- Ferran Adria on eGullet 12/16/2004.

Docsconz - Musings on Food and Life

Slow Food Saratoga Region - Co-Founder

Twitter - @docsconz

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Schaller & Weber Double Smoked Slab Bacon... (Homer Simpson style groan and drool). Available at local A&P.

=Mark

Give a man a fish, he eats for a Day.

Teach a man to fish, he eats for Life.

Teach a man to sell fish, he eats Steak

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Fully agree with Steve.

Specifically, I really loved:

Nodine's Garlic Stuffed Bacon

Nodine's Applewood Smoked Bacon

Carlton Dry Cured Bacon

Bear Creek Hickory Bacon

and of course:

Carlton Canadian Bacon :biggrin:

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We love the Nodine's Applewood Smoked Bacon. We buy it locally at Table & Vine, where it's $2.00/lb cheaper than Grateful Palate. Don't know if they ship perishables, but it may be worth contacting them and buying in bulk.

Schaller & Weber sounds good, too, but our local A&Ps pulled out of the area :sad:.

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  • 2 years later...

Recently I seem to have gotten on a mailing list for catalogs from smoked meat purveyors. I'm a fan of Nueske's-- are any of these other places in their league? I'm planning a bacon tasting-- which other sources should I include? I'd like to at least do a blind tasting of hickory vs applewood.

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I read recently in a trade magazine at work about Broadbent Hams' Pepper Bacon and how it won some award. I ordered some and it has arrived but haven't tried it yet. And, fwiw, I will be using Neuske as the measuring stick.

=R=

"Hey, hey, careful man! There's a beverage here!" --The Dude, The Big Lebowski

LTHForum.com -- The definitive Chicago-based culinary chat site

ronnie_suburban 'at' yahoo.com

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I read recently in a trade magazine at work about Broadbent Hams' Pepper Bacon and how it won some award.  I ordered some and it has arrived but haven't tried it yet.  And, fwiw, I will be using Neuske as the measuring stick.

=R=

Drive south on Interstate 75 from Atlanta and get off at Cordele, Ga. Then find one of the two Stripling's locations: smokehouse, grocery, and gas!. Get some of their smoked rib bacon. It will make you forget about any "civilized" bacon. They are not on line and do not normally ship, but I buy 40 lbs. or so whenever I pass through on the way to Florida and I have persuaded them to ship me that amount on one occasion. I can provide an address if needed.

For a grocery store brand, try Beeler's Hog Wild uncured smoked bacon. produced in Iowa. Koenemann's in Lake County Illinois also makes a fine German-style uncured bacon which is very smoky. Finally, Berger's Smokehouse in Missouri has a fine selection of country and city bacons available on line. Get the country slab.

In Montreal, smoked meat means brisket, and the finest in the world is from Schwartz's Delicatessen on Boulevard St. Laurent. They are the last deli in Montreal to cure their own.

Entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem
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I second the Flying Pigs Farm as well as the Schaller and Weber Double Smoked.

I am also a big fan of the corn cob smoked bacon at Harrington's in Vermont.

"If the divine creator has taken pains to give us delicious and exquisite things to eat, the least we can do is prepare them well and serve them with ceremony."

~ Fernand Point

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There was a great piece about bacon (and some sources for it) reprinted in the Best Food Writing series not too long ago. I'm not at home to check but I'm pretty sure it was in the 2004 edition.

I'll try to remember to check the details when I get home tonight.

=R=

"Hey, hey, careful man! There's a beverage here!" --The Dude, The Big Lebowski

LTHForum.com -- The definitive Chicago-based culinary chat site

ronnie_suburban 'at' yahoo.com

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For a benchmark, can anyone comment on comparisons with Niman Ranch Applewood Smoked Bacon?

I had it once and thought it was pretty good, but perhaps these others are better?

(This is rather widely distributed, including at Trader Joes and at least some Whole Foods. Pigs are fed natural grains and are not given hormones. Niman Ranch products can also be ordered via their website.)

"Under the dusty almond trees, ... stalls were set up which sold banana liquor, rolls, blood puddings, chopped fried meat, meat pies, sausage, yucca breads, crullers, buns, corn breads, puff pastes, longanizas, tripes, coconut nougats, rum toddies, along with all sorts of trifles, gewgaws, trinkets, and knickknacks, and cockfights and lottery tickets."

-- Gabriel Garcia Marquez, 1962 "Big Mama's Funeral"

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For a benchmark, can anyone comment on comparisons with Niman Ranch Applewood Smoked Bacon? 

I had it once and thought it was pretty good, but perhaps these others are better?

(This is rather widely distributed, including at Trader Joes and at least some Whole Foods.  Pigs are fed natural grains and are not given hormones. Niman Ranch products can also be ordered via their website.)

I've tried Niman Ranch's version (purchased at Trader Joe's) and thought that it was very good but still, I didn't like it as much as Nueske's. The big difference was the smoke, which I thought was a bit more astringent in the Niman product. Nueske's product was also a bit sweeter, which I was surprised to learn, I actually liked better.

=R=

"Hey, hey, careful man! There's a beverage here!" --The Dude, The Big Lebowski

LTHForum.com -- The definitive Chicago-based culinary chat site

ronnie_suburban 'at' yahoo.com

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You just need to make it yourself "Scrap Iron Chef" style using an old Gym Locker, a cast iron skillet, some wood chips, a computer fan and an A/C duct pipe!

:biggrin:

"What garlic is to food, insanity is to art." ~ Augustus Saint-Gaudens

The couple that eGullets together, stays together!

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http://www.scotthams.com Niether the bacon or hams use any nitrates or nitrites in the curing. Bacon the way it used to be. We order slabs and give as presents.

BTW of the commercially cured bacon and hams available, Nueske's is one of the best if not the best.

Try the Scott's cold smoked pork breakfast sausage in the 2# rolls. You will need the 2#'s, its that good. -Dick

Edited by budrichard (log)
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J.Kurowycki on First Ave. in NYC...They smoke it there after pickling it..Call ahead and be sure they have lean slabs....It's not anything free and therefore never turns gray nor tastes of mold like so many nitrate-frees do and is fabulous fried with eggs or seasoning choucroute or cassoulet or pea soup or anything else bacon is used for....

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Nodine's Smokehouse is my favorite.

Also, check out  The Grateful Palate Bacon Collection for more options.

great links, schnitz - Just in time for the holidays!! Of course, I will have to try some of the others, too. :biggrin:

Too bad that all the people who know

how to run the country are busy driving

taxicabs and cutting hair.

--George Burns

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Recently I seem to have gotten on a mailing list for catalogs from smoked meat purveyors.  I'm a fan of Nueske's-- are any of these other places in their league?  I'm planning a bacon tasting-- which other sources should I include?  I'd like to at least do a blind tasting of hickory vs applewood.

In rereading your post, I am reminded of several things.

I may just flat be lucky, but within a 15 minute drive of my house are 4 meat markets that smoke their own bacon. It's darned good bacon. All of it is different, some smokier, some a little sweeter. Each has it place. And, if I'm willing to drive within a radius of 2 hours, I have more places to buy smoked on site bacon than I can count.

Bacon taste testing. My college buds and I get together for a mom's weekend only at a resort in Northern MN every Thanksgiving weekend. We have had two bacon taste testings.

For our first taste testing, we did not control the variables enough. We should really have used 4 different pans. We also discovered that it makes a huge difference in taste-testing if the bacon is not cut to the same thick (or thin)-ness.

So, for our second taste testing, we had the meat markets all cut the bacon to the same thickness. And, we cooked in four different skillets, side by side. Lenny's place in New Ulm (The Sausage Shoppe) was a very clear winner.

Susan Fahning aka "snowangel"
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