This month, the destination was lovely Ann Arbor Michigan, were another gathering of “Bacon Camp” converged and where bacon was once again passionately and porkulently celebrated with orgiastic, gastronomical abandon.
Yes my dear friend, its Bacon Camp, an event that has continuously promised to be much more than merely a destination for Bacchus like “Baconistic” behavior.
Once upon a time, ‘Camp Bacon” was simply a one-day gathering of those who truly enjoy the ecstatic ingestion of God’s gift to man, the wonderful, cured, smoked or both bevy of beautiful, beautiful bacon.
Now this has grown to a major, newsworthy celebration, featuring several heroes and demi-gods of the Bacon Battalions that bask in this gourmand gathering of glory.
According to sources from the Washington Post to the Ann Arbor Chronicle, such notable stars of “Baco-mania” renown, like Allan Benton, the humble Tennessean whose pork bellies have made chefs swoon from New York to Napa, Herb Eckhouse, whose La Quercia pancetta and prosciutto from Iowa stand up to the best from Italy and Nick Spencer, a Brit based in Chicago who began making back bacon this spring, attended and were honored as they dazzled the crowds with both their presence and their presents..
Of course, there had to be bacon poetry readings and a performance by 73-year-old R&B artist Andre Williams, who wrote a song called “Bacon Fat” back in the year 1956, that came to define a the common “meat culture” of “Baconism,” for generations to come. “It’s a thinking person’s bacon camp,” said Ari Weinzweig, co-founder of Ann Arbor’s gourmet “mecca” Zingerman’s, which hosted the event. Camp Bacon is Weinzweig’s attempt to readdress the issues and hopefully re-channel bacon enthusiasm in a way that is real, relevant and meaningful for all.
Looking to inject and encourage a lot less emphasis on the silly and trivial, more attention paid to the authentic, substantive issues at hand.
The event cost $150 per person and was held in an industrial park near Zingerman’s creamery and bakery and the smell of bacon continued to waft alluringly through the air for hours after the everyone had eaten their fill and gone “ wee, wee , wee, all the way home.