For those of you out there, still trying to gauge exactly how HUGE today’s swelling trend of “Baco-Mania” has gotten, let this help you get a clearer picture of exactly how big and important bacon, at least “Gourmet Bacon”  has become in our society over the past few years.

Today our good friends over at “Better Homes & Gardens” dropped by to let us know that their new Holiday Menu Suggestions and Holiday Recipes have now officially been posted, so that we can pass the news on to all of you deeply dedicated “Baconistas” or as “B.H.G.” likes to refer to you as, “Baconites,” which is a pretty clever and cool term that I think I’m going to help them spread around the Bacon World as a proud and popular “Badge of Baconism” around the globe.

They also had some nice things to say about our featured recipes, which was very cool of them to take the time to mention … but that’s just the point, isn’t it? Bacon, at least the truly good, premium quality stuff, is now so popular throughout every single strata and niche of our Western Culture, that long standing, traditionalist periodicals that probably wouldn’t have thought to come by and visit even 5 years ago, are stopping by to be quite genuinely friendly and we truly do value and appreciate “B.H.G.s” for being so cool and neighborly!

Truthfully, I believe that this says as much about how much cooler, open minded and universally expanded the new “visionaries” over at “Better Homes & Garden’s” are, in comparison to many of their stodgier, more traditionally set in their “olds days ways,” competitors.

So really I want to offer up a big, sincere “10 Snout Salute” to the very awesome people over at “B.H.G.’s” and recommend that all of you go check out some of their awesome new features, including a LOT of great “Holiday Recipes!”

YES, of course some of these menu items do include the all important bacon and / or pork and others can simply and easily have some delicious bacon added or substituted in for some other less glorious and “Hog Heavenly” protein!

I highly recommend that you go check out the new, delicious menu items featured over at our new, official “Bacon Friendly” buddies website and be sure to get back to us and tell us what you think! As always, were looking forward to hearing your thoughts and sharing this whole “Bacony” experience with our “Baconite” Brethren and Sistren!

In our continual effort to always keep our readers at the very cutting edge and vanguard forefront of the gourmet bacon world, we here at Bacon Today like to sit down and get the latest and greatest news directly from the horse’s … or should we say … pig’s mouth!

Today … Bacon Today is extremely excited to be chatting with Mr. Nicodemus Green who is the brains and designer behind that totally awesome and increasingly popular “Bacon Is Like A Little Hug From God” graphic that is taking the entire bacon world by storm lately.

BT: Nicodemus, welcome Sir. Thank you for agreeing to take a little time out of your very busy schedule to have a chat with us about the design that is being proudly worn on the chests of more and more “Baconistas,” male and female, all across the country.

NG: Thanks, it’s a pleasure to get to talk to you and all of your fabulous readers today. I love Bacon Today!

BT: So where do you originally hail from and where are you currently located now?

NG: I was born in southeast Michigan, and raised in the small town of Defiance, Ohio. I spent most of my adult life in Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Austin, Texas. I currently live in Ann Arbor, Michigan. It’s a very cool, laid back little city with a great food and art scene.

BT: OK, so the Bacon World wants to know … are you a true, legitimate “Bacon Freak” or was it purely a business decision to step up and fill a void amidst the current rising tide of “Baco-Mania?”

NG: Honestly? A little bit of both. I’m a total “foodie,” I love bacon, and I love art and graphic design, so it just felt natural to me to bring those things together in some way. I just wasn’t really sure how receptive people would be to my design.

BT: That makes perfect sense! So how in the world did your life journey end up placing you in the position of suddenly designing one of the most popular “bacon oriented” t-shirt designs out there?

NG: Ha! Is that true? I hadn’t realized it’s one of the most popular “bacon oriented” t-shirt designs, but thanks for kudos!

The design wasn’t something that I ever planned on showing anybody. During my time in Austin, I discovered my love of all things “Day of the Dead,” so I knew I wanted to incorporate that imagery into the design.

I was a bit bored one cold, dark January afternoon in Michigan, and I just sat down with my laptop … and about 4 hours later, I had the design pretty much finished. I’m not sure where it came from really, it just sort of evolved on its own.

BT: That’s so cool! Alright, you mentioned earlier that there’s an interesting story about how your previous gig at Trader Joe’s ended up playing a positive role in your coming up for the idea for the t-shirt motto?

NG: Actually, the phrase “Bacon is like a little hug from God” was born one morning while I was “scarfing down” some bacon during a morning shift at Trader Joe’s back when I used to work there.

Sunday morning shifts typically start at 4am in order to receive shipments, stock, and clean the store before opening at 9am. Usually, as a reward for loyally showing up early, management would cook us an elaborate breakfast with items from the store and often that included BACON!

I remember sitting on the floor of the store eating bacon with my coworkers and we were all mesmerized by how delicious the bacon was … and the phrase just kind of popped into my head for no apparent reason. It was so catchy and funny; I just knew I had to get it out there somehow.

This was during the whole “bacon craze” of late 2008 and I thought the “foodie” world would be receptive to some kind of artwork featuring that phrase. So I played around with several designs until I finalized the design now on Bacon Freak.

BT: Awesome. OK …I did a little investigating around and discovered that this design of yours is not just loved and adored by the “Bacon World” at large, but actually has quite the following on the contemporary art scene as well. What can you tell us about that very interesting “cross over” success?

NG: It started when I emailed Grace Bonney of “Design Sponge,” which is a very popular design blog that I read everyday, hoping she would feature the print version of the design. She did, and it was a hit.

As an entirely self-taught graphic designer, I was so flattered that such design-minded folks, not to mention professional designers and food people, actually got the joke and liked my work. One thing led to another and now here we are today, talking about it over a couple of glasses of iced lemon water.

BT: Wow … that is so cool! Alright, I would be absolutely amiss if I allowed this session to come to an end without finding out “WHAT’S NEXT” for Nicodemus Green – Bacon Celebrity?

NG: Ah, great question! Well, due to the huge number of requests I’ve received over the last year, I’ve just started researching things like organic fabric tea towels, and letter pressed greeting cards featuring the design.

I even had a gentleman from Australia request laptop decals! BTW, I do have the design available on cotton canvas shopping bags through Cafe Press I would LOVE to work with a larger company designing kitchen-ware, wallpaper and fabrics featuring my designs.

BT: That’s absolutely excellent Nicodemus! Well, the very best of success in your future endeavors and thank you so very much for taking the time to sit and discuss one of the most prominent and popular bacon stories of the current decade, the “Bacon Is Like A Little Hug From God” T-shirt. Thank you Sir!

NG: My pleasure. It’s been a lot of fun!

A popular Portland, OR butcher and renowned chef, Berlin Reed, will start teaching a series of three classes designed to teach bacon enthusiasts the various “ins and outs” of the numerous, flavorful cures (taste enhancers) used throughout the bacon industry, as well as a few special “custom concoctions” of his own, to make the worlds greatest ever flavor (BACON) taste even better!

Chef and butcher Berlin Reed is the insightful and informative writer behind “The Ethical Butcher” a website and blog dedicated to his authentically held moral principals and driven by his sincerely valued personal relationships with the local, small farm owners, as well as his deep love of food and respect for the animals we eat, along with the environment on which we all depend.

We all know that bacon is the ultimate, perfect food, but have you ever wanted to know more about the plethora of herbs, spices, vegetables, flowers, fruit, spirits and other flavorful factors that are infused by manual meat massage in order to create a taste that is utterly unique and found no where else on Planet Earth?

Then you definitely need to get yourself to Portland for this 3-part series of classes, which begins August 10^th and covers a god solid education and ample samples of bacon cured with fruits and flowers. Then, the following week, on the 17^th, Chef Berlin will present bacon cured with various coffees, teas and spirits, all culminating on Aug. 24th, were the coarse focuses on all kinds of delicious glazes and crusts, including the age-old traditions of rolling bacon slabs in everything from oatmeal to pea meal.lasses cost $40 per session or you can get the package deal of all 3 for only $100. For more information, check out Chef Berlin’s blog.

The c

Consider the “Bacon Love!” mini day-to-day calendar from Andrews McMeel publishing. Although the publisher missed out on what would be a sales-boosting slogan for their company (“Without bacon, it’s not a McMeel!”), this stationery commodity delivers a great gift to bacon aficionados everywhere: namely that, with a recipe, quotation, trivia, or celebration on every one of 2011′s 365 days, never again will we let a day pass by without pausing to give thanks for bacon’s crisp and plentiful blessings.

Thinking about the year-long quantification of bacon’s virtues limned in the McMeel codex triggered in me a flashback (which is like fatback, but more nostalgic and less salty) to my high school days, when I was obsessed with the Broadway musical Rent. Yes, unlike the raw materials that constitute bacon, I have long been an incurable ham. What would Jonathan Larson’s Bohemian proto-hipsters have thought about this calendar? Well, it’s probably not their cup of herbal, fair trade, shade-grown tea, based on their predilection for pasta with meatless balls. What I meant to ask was, in the spirit of Rent‘s signature uplifting anthem “Seasons of Love”: how do you measure, measure a year? In rashers, in sizzle, in protein, in B3 (Niacin)…

Okay, on second thought, Rent is probably fine just the way it is (except for a few songs in the second act: I’m looking at you, “Your Eyes”) and the calendar is fine just the way McMeel created it. I don’t think I would want to eat five hundred twenty five thousand six hundred slices of bacon in one year at the rate of one per minute, but thinking about it makes me happy and optimistic about the opportunities for bacon love in the coming calendar year. Do you think they have rush delivery?

Click here to purchase

Recently I stumbled upon this video about the classic age of bacon and the American favorites stream into popular culture.

After watching and hearing about all the bacon products. I decided to search for the best kind of products for bacon lovers! Aside from the normal products, like bacon kitchen utensils and bacon foods (bacon bits, bacon favored cupcakes, etc.) you could also have a bacon scarf (my personal favorite this homemade knitted one) or bacon art or so much more….
Here are my top 10 favorite products found during my search:

10. Bacon Bandaids: Yes friends, anytime you get a paper-cut or the next time you knick your arm on a staple you could cover it up with a adhesive bacon band-aid.

These particular band-aids are even cut to have edges like real bacon

9. Bacon USB: A few of these can be found online, I posted the link to the most realistic looking 4GB at a reasonable price for a trendy commodity. The perfect way to show off your love for bacon with a piece seemingly sticking out of your computer.

8. Bacon Earrings: I own a couple hundred of pairs of earrings, so I have a preference towards them. There are two types of bacon earrings that I really enjoyed. The first being a pair that looks like real little strips of bacon. And then the was a breakfast pair:

7. Bacon Gummies: We have gummy bears, gummy worms, gummy coke bottles and now we have bacon gummy. It looks like bacon, it is packaged like real bacon but it doesn’t taste like bacon. Apparently that is a step to far for the candy makers, its a bacon gummy that tastes like strawberries which just makes it amusing. But I still think it is a pretty cool product.

6. Bacon Formal Wear: You can find tuxs that have bacon designs, dresses, and ties. No article of clothing left unturned even shoes and headbands. (There are even bacon bras ladies, in case you wanted to be ahead of the next trend).

5. Bacon Tape: Much like duct tape but with bacon on it, it’s what holds the universal together.

4. Bacon Envelopes: This one came close to being one of my favorites. Envelopes that taste like bacon!

3.Bakon: A potato vodka that tastes like bacon! We might be exploring some of the drinks we can mix with that!

2. Bacon Jelly Beans: Bacon the candy meat, small enough to swallow in one bite and plenty of them to snack on for an entire afternoon.

1. Bacon: A Love Story. A book filled with trivial facts and enjoyable stories about everyone’s favorite meat.

Remember you  never know what can prove your love for bacon out there! There are over a 100 different types of products and several variations of each!

First it was the scintillating sizzle of the State Fair down in Florida and now the happy Hoosiers of Indiana are going hog wild at their State Fair, over the tempting taste treat quickly becoming known world wide as the Bacon – Cheese Doughnut Burger!

The Reas family is at it again, as 53 year old Dennis Reas, of Corydon Indiana was up to his old tricks, custom creating consummate “culinary combination” cuisine by building a delicious bacon cheeseburger safely, securely and semi-sanely, between buns of two Krispy Kreme Doughnuts.

Now before anyone starts to question the why someone would consider doing such a seemingly strange act, let me assure you that when this whole Krispy Kreme Bacon Burger business started flaring up about 5 years ago, I set out to investigate the situation and came away fully satisfied that while I would not regularly submit my gourmet bacon and my Top 1.5% cuts of beef to being sandwiched between to sugary sweet doughnuts on a regular basis, every now and then, it truly is a most fascinating and savory flavor sensation.

It seems that the Reas family are the very same folks behind such delectable delights as “Deep Fried Pepsi, Chocolate-Covered Bacon ( one of my personal favorites) and of course, the famous / or infamous (your call) Deep-Fried Butter that has been served up at previous Indiana events of note, so these people already have a powerful pork popularity providing press and public “uh-proval” to pretty much everything that the Reas Family serves up these days.

For those of you “thinking outside the bun,” or should we say, donut, perhaps the Deep-Fried Sushi, Deep-Fried Dill Pickles, Deep-Fried Candy Bars, (am I beginning to sense a trend here) or the Chocolate-Covered Popcorn Balls, Root-Beer Marinated Ribs, or possibly a scrumptious plate of Pork Patty covered with …. Of course, more pork, but this time it’s “Pulled Pork” and yes, if you insist, you can get that served on a bun as well, but like Seinfeld’s infamous “Soup Nazi” would say … “No Krispy Kreme for YOU – Come Back; Six Months!”

To me, Sunday mornings aren’t complete without two things: bacon and National Public Radio. This American Life is one of my favorite shows to listen to while eating bacon: Ira Glass’s bland, nasal vocal tones complement the salt and fat in my breakfast treat, and the whole thing is just about as much enjoyment as you can have with your pants on.

In episode 413, the journalists from the show visit several different counties in Georgia, and reporter Nancy Updike mentions in passing that two of Georgia’s adjacent counties are named Coffee and Bacon, but not for the reasons you might think: they’re named for people. (Seriously, maple syrup glazed bacon: RESULT. Kick those starchy pancakes to the curb.)

So I was reading about Senator Bacon, and thought that maybe I’d mine his biography for some comic detail, and when I found that that he was Chairman of the Committee for Engrossed Bills, I thought, “This stuff writes itself.” But I gulped when I found Senator Bacon’s most enduring legacy: in addition to being a soldier in the Confederate Army, his dying act was to establish in his will a whites-only “public” park in Macon, Georgia. If he thought his will would stand up in court, Bacon was mistaken about Macon. The Supreme Court struck down his bequest, but it certainly makes Bacon less a figure of fun and more of a reminder of how hurtful and backwards this country’s prejudices once caused people to behave.

If Senator Bacon were alive today, I don’t know what he’d think about having a black President in the White House: maybe he’d be among the erroneous few who falsely believe Barack Obama is a bacon-eschewing Muslim. But I for one am glad to live in the America where the Union triumphed, and where the 14th Amendment will forever ensure that a park is where whites and others meet.

I thought I knew a lot about bacon, until I read an article on Asylum.com.

Did you know that bacon started in China around 1500 BC?  Yeah, neither did I!  (I’m not exactly sure where and when I thought bacon was “born” but I know I wasn’t thinking it was during the Shang Dynasty.)

Check out their site and original post here.

And by all means, enjoy!

For the past several years we’ve been hearing about the ups and downs, the successes and failures of scientists attempting to create pigs that have been genetically altered to create their own, internal “Omega-3 Fatty Acids,” which supposedly would logically be “Makin’ Bacon” that is dramatically more healthy , particularly for the heart.

Omega-3 fatty acids are those naturally occurring compounds found in fish; that help the body to greatly reduce the incidence of various forms of heart disease. But that just it … isn’t it. Omega-3 fatty acids are completely NATURAL in fish, NOT in Pigs.

So logically, it’s natural, good and healthy to eat it in fish, and by the very same logic, not natural, good and healthy to eat it in genetically mutated pork. Besides, if people would actually consider eating it … supposedly for their health, wouldn’t it be wiser to just get out a take a walk a few times a week for all sorts of numerous health benefits to the body, not just one?

We truly need to stop and ask ourselves, at what cost are we willing to go along with whatever “Dr. Strangelove” comes up with late at night in his secret laboratory, so that we can continue to allow pure, unadulterated “human laziness and lethargy” to drive straight into a diet of scientifically processed, genetically altered “Franken-Food,” merely in hopes that we won’t ever have to get up off of our ever widening derrieres in order to take a walk around the block a few times a week?

If we all already know from personal experience that farm fresh, free range, country raised bacon tastes 100 times better than the low quality, mass-produced, store bought, generic, stuff, then why would we even consider, let alone risk eating “Scientifically Processed Animal Matter! Hmmm, that term seems oddly familiar, like it stands for something. Ah yes … Scientifically Processed Animal Matter … S.P.A.M. Got it!

Wow, what a trip, the words of the “profits” (pun intend) are written on the grocery store shelves! Be care out there!

Are you tired of slow-cooking your bacon in grandma’s vintage cast iron pan? Or do you worry that baking bacon on high heat in your oven will ruin its juicy flavors?

Then fret no more, bacon lover. We might have a solution that can ease your pork belly concerns.

Check out the Bacon Wave Microwave Bacon Cooker, a new offering from the As Seen on TV folks. The Bacon Wave Microwave Bacon Cooker is a friend of bacon lovers everywhere. It lets you cook bacon with a precision touch in your microwave. In other words, you get the old-school frying pan flavor, minus the old-school frying pan and the dreaded cleanup!

But wait—there’s more! The Bacon Wave Microwave Bacon Cooker also lets you make bacon healthier! Without a bacon, you get less bacon fat. And fewer calories only means a fitter you with better cholesterol.

And it gets even better! (Yes, we’re CRAZY about this thing!) The Bacon Wave Microwave Bacon Cooker also cooks up to 14 pieces of sweet, sweet bacon at once. Stack two Bacon Cookers and you can make up to 28 pieces simultaneously.

We could go on. But for now, we suggest you check out Bacon Wave Microwave Bacon Cooker today. For more information or to order click here.