Chicken Fried Bacon (no it's not a song, it's food)

I know that this blog is all about music, its meaning and BLAH blah blah, blah, BLAH blah blah. However a couple days ago I ate chicken fried bacon, and I have got to share.

Here's the deal, a couple months ago I came across this clip on youtube.com about this restaurant in Texas that sells country fried bacon. The owner's logic is, "A lot them [Americans] chose to eat bacon strips, so what can you do? Y'know, what IS good for you? It's your own body that can tell what's good for you."

C'mon people it's 2009, I do hope when people hear my mom's joke about bacon grease lubricating the arteries so blood can move faster that they know it's a joke.

I e-mailed the clip to some of my friends, we made some jokes and in the back of my mind I figured that maybe one of these days I would actually try deep fried bacon.

I love food. I love everything about food. When I was younger, I cooked with my mom all of the time and would watching cooking shows with her. Between my wife and I, I do most of the cooking not by obligation but by choice, because I love cooking. I think of food as art. Sometimes I'm in the mood for a tasting menu at a place like Charlie Trotters (which I ate at once, which honestly was one most transcendent artistic experiences in my life) and other times, like my need to watch an action film, I grab a hot dog at the best hot dog place in Chicago Poochie's (char-dog with everything but relish).

There's a hot dog place by the grocery store that my wife and I go to called Wiener and Still Champion and a couple weeks ago I decided to try one of their hot dogs. It was ok, but not the best I've had (I've been to very a dozen different hot dog places in the Chicago area). As I paid I noticed hanging above the register a sign advertising chicken fried bacon.

So at my birthday party last week, I was talking to one of my friends Sara and she was mourning the fact that she hadn't gotten a chance to try chicken fried bacon on her last trip to Texas. I enthusiastically chimed in that I had found a place in Evasnton (where we live) that did in fact sell this dish and we enthusiastically set up an outing to go eat some deep friend bacon.

On a cold and rainy Tuesday afternoon, we drove to Wiener and Still Champion.

Sara and I were the only customer in the restaurant which made sense seeing how it was around 4 pm but it was still a little unnerving. We got an order of chicken fried bacon and a corn dog. After a couple minutes later our order was ready and here was the bacon.

The bacon came with two dipping sauces, a hot sauce and what we thought was tater sauce which was later reveled by the owner as a "garlic aioli" (aioli is a rich sauce of crushed garlic, egg yolks, lemon juice, and olive oil). The batter was peppery and crispy and went well with both sauces. The bacon itself were large thick strips.

There was one major problem, the bacon itself was cooked, but soggy, not crispy or slightly chewy which is my preference. This problem lies in the concept of this dish. The reason why many people agree that the best way to cook chicken is to fry it is because the batter seals in the meat and basically steams the meat at a high temperature in it own juices locking in the flavor. The meat inside a expertly cooked piece of fried chicken truly is amazing. Frying chicken solves the problem of other preparation of chicken (especially involving chicken breast meat) which leave the meat dry and tasteless.

Does anyone really want to seal in the juices of bacon?

When we cook bacon what we are doing is drawing out the fat and grease to concentrate the flavor of the meat in turn changing the rubbery texture of the meat to a more appealing firmness. Frying bacon does the same thing to the meat that frying chicken does, leaving the meat itself juicy and soft. While that sounds great for chicken the idea of a soft and juicy piece of bacon is pretty revolting.

Sara and I ate most of order of bacon and I ate the corn dog, which was probably the best corn dog I've ever had (if you're into corn dogs you've got to check this place out). We didn't feel gross, but we didn't feel great either. The conclusion was that sharing an order was a good idea because eating a whole order by oneself is probably a feeling close to death.

I can now say that I've eaten chicken fried bacon. Do I regret it? No. Will I ever eat chicken friend bacon ever again? No. Is this something that you need to try? Not really.

In reaction to the health food craze, some people do things like deep fry bacon which is a fundamentally flawed dish. If you love a dish for its flavor and texture, I say enjoy it, embrace it, even if it is on the fatty side. But eating food that is conceptually flawed for the sake of being unhealthy is just silly. That's not loving food. That is making a mockery of the art of cuisine.

Now it's time for me to go exercise and even though I'll eventually burn off the calories from my adventure, I don't think I can ever burn away the memory of crispy, greasy, rubbery and chewy experience that is chicken friend bacon.