What would you do if you were completely out of bacon and your next Monthly Gourmet Bacon Club “Membership-ment” wasn’t due for another 4 days?

How would you satisfy your need to feed on the world’s only “Perfect Food,” what we have come to call Bacon? Obviously it would be physically impossible to go without bacon for 4 days, so that option is simply ridiculous.

Would you risk buying mass produced, store bought bacon. That’s pretty dangerous because, as you know, once that stuff gets into your fridge, it will eventually get moved into your freezer, then out the garage freezer and over time, it’ll be completely forgotten about and therefore never, ever go away!

Well, thankfully we now finally have “the answer for” you that we believe can help you get through the mistake of not ordering enough gourmet bacon to safely and comfortably get you through your month.

Special Thanks to Dan S. of Los Angeles, California, who had the interest, time, energy and clever idea to assemble a special forces team of 12 serious “Baconistas” to go out and compare / compile a rating system, grading (A) The actual quality of the bacon that is used, as well as (B) The over-all taste, quality and enjoyment of the menu item served up at 12 of the most visited fast food restaurants.

As explained by Dan the grading system is thoroughly logical and quite easy enough to understand. Each of the 12 members of the team of the rank the restaurants from #1 to #12, so that when scoring, #1 gets 1 point and #12 gets 12 points. Like in golf, the lower the score that you receive, the better the ranking the restaurant gets on the list.

Then all 12 grading sheets are carefully tabulated, and the restaurant with the lowest number … wins.

Let us know what you think of the results of Dan and his team’s investigation and we hope this helps those of you who usually don’t do the fast food thing, but simply have to get your “Bacon Fix” before you totally lose it. Thanks Dan.

Here’s what the team concluded when it came to fast Food restaurant with the best Bacon Meal available out there:

#1: Wendy’s

#2: Subway

#3: KFC

#4: Starbuck’s

#5: Quiznos

#6: Carl’s Junior

#7: Del Taco

#8: Arby’s

#9: McDonald’s

#10: Dairy Queen

#11: Taco Bell

#12: Tie Between Sonic and Burger King

Bacon Today reader Nick H. sent in this review of his recent trip to McDonald’s for their “Big Breakfast” plate. Got a review of your own or other story idea? Send it to us at: bacontoday@gmail.com.

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by Nick H.

I don’t often go to McDonald’s…heck I try to avoid the place like the plague. But sometimes you’re hungry and nothing else is open and you just need to stop and eat something. That was the case last Sunday so I stopped at the golden arches and ordered up the Big Breakfast plate. I thought about a McMuffin, but they only offer ham & sausage and I wanted some bacon, even if it was only going to be fast food bacon. I had some hope…

Any hope I had was shattered when I popped the lid off the plate. I was instantly reminded why I never eat at McDonald’s. The food just looked rather “off”. And the bacon? I could see right away that this was the thinnest bacon I had ever eaten. I picked up a slice and could see the people at the counter through the bacon it was that thin.

I took a bite of the bacon and sure, it was from a pig, but it was incredibly bland and strangely cooked. By strange I mean that it seemed like it was in some weird state of limbo between crispy and soft. I’m a crispy bacon guy myself and this was not nearly crispy enough. I don’t think people that like softer bacon would have been happy either.

I wouldn’t recommend McDonald’s bacon to anyone who truly loves bacon. You probably already knew that though as a bacon lover and are wondering why I even bothered. Well, when you get that early morning craving and can’t find it anywhere else sometimes you just have to go where you have to go…

Traveling for business often means scrambling for bacon wherever you can get some. In our travels we’ve tried the bacon various fast food restaurants: Wienerschnitzel, Tim Horton’s, Burger King, Hardee’s and Sonic to name just a few.

One place that really impressed us with their fast-food bacon was Sonic. We enjoyed their bacon so much in fact we built a grilled cheese and bacon sandwich with 30 slices of bacon. Unfortunately, the next bacon we got from Sonic was not so splendid.

Here’s how the morning went down when I got my Sonic breakfast. I ordered the CroisSONIC™ Breakfast Sandwich, but the particular Sonic I want to was out of croissants. So I opted for the BREAKFAST TOASTER® with bacon instead. Take a look at the photos above. The bread was torn and rather soggy and upon opening the sandwich only a few torn, beat-up looking specks of bacon were present. Those tiny pieces of bacon were overcooked and not very tasty either.

In fact, I even ordered a side of bacon and the guy behind the microphone said “uh, I don’t see a place to order a side of bacon here so uh, I’ll just give you some extra bacon.” I never received that extra bacon and boy did my sandwich need some bacon help.

I’ll give Sonic the benefit of the doubt and try their bacon again but this bacon lover, while not quite scorned, hath shed a single salty tear.

Stopped by Starbucks the other day for a quick meeting. Since they had hot food and I was hungry I decided to give their bacon a try. I’ll be honest, I didn’t have much hope for bacon at a coffee shop.

The sandwich (referred to as an “Artisan Bacon” by the barista) was decent. That’s about all I can say about about it. The bacon was quite weak, the gouda cheese was minimal and the eggs were bland. The saving grace for this one is the artisan roll. The bread was quite good and saved the sandwich from being a real stinker.

If you’re in need of a shot of bacon to go with your espresso, I’d say hold off until you get somewhere that carries a better brand of the good stuff.

A new sandwich is coming to a fast food restaurant near you. From KFC comes the new Double Down, a sandwich “so meaty, there’s no room for a bun!” according to the restaurant chain.

What’s in the sandwich is compelling… “two thick and juicy boneless white meat chicken filets (Original Recipe® or Grilled), two pieces of bacon, two melted slices of Monterey Jack and pepper jack cheese and Colonel’s Sauce.”

What’s not included with the sandwich is what intrigues us most – no buns! KFC is using chicken breasts in lieu of the traditional sandwich bread bookends.

Think this is one we should review? The KFC Double Down hits the streets on April 12, 2010.

Wendy’s has introduced a new bacon burger. This time it’s the Bacon & Blue. Our question to you is — what do you think? We want your reviews!

The basic details are:

• North American beef that’s never frozen
• Blue cheese crumbles
• Thick cut applewood smoked bacon
• Sauteed onions
• Steakhouse sauce

We’ll be doing a review of this burger soon, but before we do we want to hear what you think. Let us know!

Touted by West Coast fast food restaurant Carl’s Jr. as “Charbroiled 100% Black Angus beef topped with crispy bacon, slices of melted Swiss and American cheese, and mayonnaise served on toasted sourdough bread,” we’re slightly suspicious as to the 6-dollar worthiness of this particular sandwich.

While we’ve enjoyed Carl’s Jr. bacon burgers in the past, we’re not so sure the Grilled Cheese Bacon Six Dollar Burger™ with all that cheese, sourdough bread, and a big beef patty are going to allow the bacon taste to shine through.

Have you tried this burger? Let us know how it tasted and if it was worthy of the 6-dollar moniker!

Wendy’s came out with a burger that has 6 patties.  6!

After looking up the stats on this burger I could only find the info on the Baconator Triple, which is  HALF the size of the 6 patty (duh!), so I’ve doubled everything I found to get a better idea of what is in this 6 burger death wish:

• 2660 calories
• 172 grams of fat
• 690 mg of cholesterol
• 180 grams of protein (okay, that’s not bad… just triple what any human being needs)
• 94 grams of carbs
• The Baconator Triple has 9 strips of bacon… does the 6 patty have 18??  (Swoon?)

Sweet Hamhocks.  I can feel my stroke forming in my left lobe.  And check out this guy, he actually ATE the whole thing and didn’t die (immediately):

This guy either is A) a new breed of human being or B) a complete and utter idiot.

I really thought around 2:04 that he was going to throw up.  Or quit.  Or fall over dead.  But either way, kudos for Wendy’s for going that extra mile and keeping us meat lovers flush in bacon!  (Although, we may send you our medical bill.  Just saying…)

Nutritional Guide Referenced:
http://www.wendys.com/food/Nutrition.jsp

photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/io_burn/1331271360/

According to the box, I was in for a DERlicious meal. I was about to embark upon my first ever meal at the hot dog chain restaurant Wienerschnitzel. Yes folks, I have lived in California for 25 years and never once set foot in the west coast home of Germanic wienosity. (I’ll pause for your collective gasp)

Once I arrived at the red & yellow palace of stuffed franks my eyes spotted something I knew I had to try — the all beef barbecue bacon hot dog. Adding some fries and a soda was a natural fit so for just under $7.00 I was on my way to a beefy, bacony bonanza.

The dog arrived in a well-designed box and upon opening the lid I was impressed by the meal’s appearance. The hot dog was covered in BBQ sauce, shredded cheese and a thick slice of bacon. As is customary when tasting any bacony meal, a piece of bacon was torn off and tasted without the influence of the rest of the food. The Wienerschnitzel bacon was quite tasty and would have been good as a meal in itself.

After testing the quality of bacon it was on to the full hot dog concoction. From first bite to last the mix of beef dog, cheese, BBQ and bacon were a solid combination that really filled up this tester. I’d recommend this meal to anyone looking for a quick bacon fix on the west coast of the United States.

Smaste™ Rating: 29.598