Casual Conversation

I don't care for bacon

That's fair, everyone has their own tastes

it doesn't have much flavor

Uh... what? 🤨 I think this is just objectively wrong

You're buying the wrong bacon.

I like it, when it's useful. But does anyone remember the 2012ish bacon craze that everyone fucking had. I think that was one of the first marketing over-reactions to an internet meme. Fucking bacon ketchup. Just add salt to my salt please.

Looking over your comments, you've fallen prey to crappy industrial food practices. And it's hard to avoid tbh. Most of the bacon out in stores doesn't have much flavor. You have to either research brands to find a good one, or live close enough to where someone makes bacon the right way so you can get out while bypassing the bullshit. Mind you, just because someone is making bacon on their own farm, that's not a guarantee it's good, but it's likely to be better than the crap in most stores.

Good bacon is very flavorful. Yeah, there's salt to it, that's part of making bacon. But you get a lot more than that assuming the person making it stays fairly free when curing. It doesn't have to be just salt. But smoking rather than using liquid smoke is the real flavor power. Liquid smoke tastes anywhere from just fake and off to outright unpleasant.

Unfortunately, the ability to be certain of a local producer is long gone. Even butcher's shops are harder to find in populous cities. And it isn't like us rural and rural adjacent folks van guarantee access to local goods just because we're near a farm. Industrial food exists for a reason beyond just profit (though that's why it's usually not that good), and keeping a supply chain going means that most farms, even those that are family owned and operated, don't sell to the public at all, even if they do make some product for themselves.

Like, the guy I get most of my pork products from is a rarity. And he doesn't sell openly, you have to know him already, and be aware that he's not a grocery store. You get what you get, when it's ready, and not one damn day sooner lol. Same with the cousin that I get beef from.

doesn't have much flavor

Are you just getting Oscar Meyer "bacon?" Cuz good bacon overpowers everything you put it on usually.

Agreed, but for a slightly different reason. It's the curing process that is the star. There's beef bacon. Tofu bacon.

When I want something pickled it doesn't always have to be a cucumber. Picked jalapeno is great. Jardiniere is fucking delicious.

I'm saying curing makes things salty and crispy, which is awesome when you want it. Just wish it wasn't always pork.

Assuming you're talking about American bacon strips, it depends on the bacon, and it depends on how it's cooked. Finely sliced and super crispy ... ehh, I'm not into that. Give me some nice thick peppered bacon, just at the cusp of becoming crispy.

I will murder for candied bacon.

OP has apparently never had Fletchers thick sliced pepper bacon that Costco sells. Bacon is the best meat, and I'll prove it. It's the meat you add to other meats to make them better. Filet mignon? Considered the best cut of beef. Wrap it in bacon? Even better. Scallops are among the best seafood meats. Wrap it in bacon? Absolutely delicious.

Salt, fat, yes, but also smoke and sweetness. Complex flavors are contained within.

Edit to add: Of course everyone has preferences. You don't have to like bacon, and your feelings are valid. But, if you think that bacon doesn't have much flavor, can I ask you if you've been eating "uncured" bacon? Because "uncured" bacon is an abomination unto the lord. It's garbage, and worse it's a lie. "Uncured" bacon is cured with celery juice. It's fully cured. There's nothing uncured about it.

See, nitrates and nitrites are responsible for the curing process. Nitrates turn raw meat into smoky cured meat, and nitrites give it that lovely pinkish-red color. It's a chemical process that makes meat taste better and last longer.

Nitrates and nitrites are found in root and leafy vegetables, and kill bacteria. They are also found in wood, but we don't really eat wood. They can also be produced via a variety of chemical processes that won't be appetizing at all.

Cured meats can be bathed in nitrates and nitrites, or they can be smoked. The smoke will provide the nitrates and nitrites, although a lot of "naturally smoked" products have added nitrates and nitrites.

Both are good for you in small quantities, and bad for you in large quantities. You shouldn't eat bacon with every meal, but the quantity of nitrates and nitrites in bacon are fine in moderation.

The amount of nitrates and nitrites used in curing meat is highly regulated. In the US, you cannot call anything "cured" unless it has a specific amount of added nitrates, and the amount of nitrites is limited.

Except there's a loophole.

If the nitrates and nitrites come from a natural source, like celery juice, then they aren't regulated at all. It could be higher or lower concentrations of each, and there's no requirement to document how much of each is present in the recipe. And because there are no "added" nitrates or nitrites, it legally cannot be labelled with the word "cured."

So bacon manufacturers have figured out that they can market this "uncured" bacon as a healthier alternative to normal bacon. But we don't know for sure that it is healthier, in fact it might be worse for your health. The only thing we know for sure is that it tastes like celery.

Now, celery flavor works in a lot of recipes. It's distinctive and subtle when paired with carrots and onions in a mirepoix. In bacon, however, the celery flavor competes with the salt and the smokiness to make the bacon blander. It's just bad.

But the label tests well with shoppers. Who doesn't want guilt-free bacon? It costs the same (celery juice is just as cheap as manufactured nitrates and nitrites) and it tastes almost like regular bacon. It has all the same fat, calories, and sodium content.

So Write your Congressperson! Tell them you demand new legislation regarding the labeling of so-called "uncured" bacon. I guarantee that if we got rid of the misleading implication that it is a healthier alternative to bacon, the product would disappear entirely.

Or don't. It's not really that serious.

'Overrated' as in exceeds expectations

I started making my own, and I couldn't disagree with you more. Store bought bacon isn't good. Butcher or homemade is the way.

I love it but the pigs make me sad

I agree.

It's good as an addition to say a burger. Eating it straight? I want meat, not tiny thin meat strips.

I don't eat meat anymore but I didn't like bacon when I did. Always eather too hard and gross or too chewy and gross. If anything I was jealous that everyone else seemed to be getting something out of it that I wasn't.

The crispy crunch is what I preferred to the actual taste of bacon. I've been trying to cook up sliced mushrooms for a similar texture, but I've been really unsuccessful in my attempts thus far. My omelettes have been woefully squishy ever since getting bacon out of my diet completely. Spicy pork sausage tho, I'll have to look a pig in the eyes to give that up.

I was initially puzzled about the differences in bacon between US/CA and Aus, thought it must be due to different animals or meat production. Then I realised that it's just a different cut of bacon - mostly only the "streaky" bacon seems to be popular in US/CA. In Aus we usually have shortcut or middle bacon, and it's way better IMO. Like a bacon steak in comparison, meatier and not swimming in fat.

I've heard the same thing said about eggs and things like tomatoes.

The issue is your eating low quality factory farm shit.

The difference in flavor is insane for most things between factory and locally grown by responsible farmers.

I do not eat animal products anymore, but when I did there was a salt cured smoked bacon we drove into VERY rural Tennessee for, where I swear I smelled crosses burning, and that is bacon like no other. The smokiness is so intense. It can be shipped anywhere in the US and if you want to give real bacon a try it's called Benton's.