cadraver.net

Originally posted in the BAOS forums.

It was during Christmas of 2007 when I was first inspired to bake my own batch of chocolate-chip bacon cookies, after being informed of its existence whilst gaming. As an experimenting cook who would just about eat anything, this proved to be a challenge of taste and predetermination

After getting my hands dirty for about an hour or two, and grabbing them from the oven about 15 minutes later, I found that the bacon had indeed meshed rather well with the butter. Because I had stripped the obvious bits -such as the fat- from the strips, my unwitting tasters assumed that the hardened pieces sticking out of the were jam pieces. After taking a few bites, they said in all honesty that the cookies were rather good and complimented especially on the ‘jam bites’. The look on their faces was priceless when they eventually learned about the secret ingredient, though more than one raised an eyebrow in thoughtfulness.

All except a few went on munching, and asked for more, though they did add that they would have treated the cookies like anathema if they knew beforehand. From their comments, it was the sweet buttery flavour with the slight savoury nature of the bacon pieces that gave the pastries an interesting though not unwelcome taste.

Some time had passed until I came across the insane Bacon Explosion (which I will definitely try one fine day , after which I was tempted to start another bacon-affiliated recipe. I decided to expand on my original recipe further, and I may have been inspired by the richness of chocolate icing on pudding and chocolate cakes in the area, which may have led me to create the following recipe.

Chocolate Covered Bacon

Ingredients

1. Approx. 600g back bacon
2. 1 large bar (250g) dark cooking chocolate

1) Chop the bacon into small pieces and fry them.

2) While the bacon is on the fry, grab a large pot and fill it halfway with water. Break the cooking chocolate into smaller pieces and drop them into a smaller pot before placing that pot in the waters of the larger. This will simulate a double boil to prevent the burning of the chocolate pieces and also keep it in a constant liquid state. The outer boil is slightly murky because I dropped some chocolate pieces in it by mistake.

3) I added some water to the chocolate pieces to make it more liquidy, and not too rich. After your bacon has been fried to satisfaction, pat them with a paper towel to remove excess grease, and transfer them to the choc-pot. I lathered each piece generously by tossing the whole lot into the smaller pot.

4) Put the covered bacon in a tray, covered by several layers of greaseproof paper (though there was no grease to be seen, as I recalled). I could have used aluminum foil, but I had some paper lying around unused, so I went with it anyhow. After this, I placed the pan into the fridge.

5) I still had a fair bit of melted chocolate left. With a few bacon pieces still stuck in the choc-pot. Considering that I’m not a very wasteful person, I decided to make the remainder into a drink. by pouring a fair bit of milk into it. It turned out to be a sweet, thick mixture, coupled with the occasional savoury bits left around.

I had to admit, it was actually quite tasty, though a little weird.

Taste Report

The chocolate-covered bacon had a rich outer flavour, followed by a soft crunch. There is a savoury taste that lingers in the mouth even after swallowing, and I can’t help but wonder if I ought to place the finished bits in the oven to make the chocolate harden, because I reckon they melt really, really fast in room temperature.

For those of you who are familiar with ba gua, this tastes exactly like it. Go figure.

Filed under: The Kitchen by Cadraver Tagged with: ba gua • bacon • boil • chocolate • confectionaries • double boil • pork