Breaking Off A Piece

If the current climate of the internet is to be believed, the simple inclusion of the word bacon in this sentence should be enough to engage you sufficiently to want to read the rest of this column.

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Did it work?

Let’s start with what we know: Bacon tastes good. It’s always tasted good, since they invented it in medieval times or by the Mesopotamians or on a farm in the 1800s or something. This is not in dispute.*

*And please don’t go all “Vegetarians don’t think bacon’s good” on me. I have many friends who are vegetarians and they have no beef with bacon at all they just choose not to eat it why are you projecting such hostility on them is this because of an insecurity?

Bacon also tastes good when eaten with other things. Sometimes, it even tastes good when eaten with things that you might not think traditionally eat it with, like a in a bloody mary or inside of a cinnamon roll. This is also not in dispute.

However, at some point in 2011 or so, the internet decided together that bacon is the greatest thing in the world and should be consumed not only in excessive amounts but also incorporated into all dishes, cocktails, physical activities and greeting cards.*

*You’re waiting for a Lady Gaga meat dress joke. It’s not coming.

Also, as a mandatory condition to said agreement, the internet also decided that everybody needs to be told about how good bacon is. Over. And over. And over again.

It wasn’t always like this. There was a point, once, when bacon was simply just a tasty food, similar to pizza or steak or apples, and not the second coming of Will Smith. We ate it oftentimes at breakfast, but not exclusively so, along with other breakfast meats, such as ham and sausage. Characters whose personas were highlighted by rampant love of a particular food and beverage item were laughed at, not emulated.

Something changed, and I can’t say I’m excited. At the moment, just enjoying the taste of bacon and not making T-shirts about it too is somehow anti-bacon. If you’re not with us, you’re against us. A REAL MAN USES A BACON NAPKIN AND THEN USES HIS GREASY FINGERS TO TAKE A PICTURE OF IT AND POST IT ON INSTAGRAM. A FANCY MAN DOES THE SAME EXCEPT HE JUST CALLS IT PORK BELLY. A REAL WOMAN PUTS HOW MUCH SHE LOVES BACON IN HER TINDER PROFILE TO SIGNIFY THAT SHE IS DATEABLE. WHAT IS PINTEREST.

Get off my lawn.

My wonderful mom, Mother Bar, sent the candy bar pictured above to me for St. Nick’s about a month ago, likely doing so for Sisters Bar and Brother Bar as well. It was incredibly sweet of her to do, especially since she knows I like the word “taters”. I ate it today, breaking off a piece for some friends. Everybody liked it enough. The “pigs” taste was strong, the “taters” less so. I would have preferred more “taters”.

In all, was a tasty candy bar, but it seems it was pandering to this trendy bacon obsession. I don’t think this candy bar exists ten years ago. And when people post this column to their bacon forums and come to cure me with all the salt and low-temperature smoke that they can muster, I don’t think they are really going to care.