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Cosmic Variance
« New Horizons
Science in the white house »

Holiday Gift Suggestions

by Julianne Dalcanton

In the long-standing CV tradition of love for cured pork products, may we suggest the giant bag of pre-cooked bacon from Costco?

Bag-O-Bacon

Our holiday season is filled with the joyful noise of loved ones asking “Would you like some bacon with that?”

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December 18th, 2008 3:11 PM Tags: bacon
in Advice, Food and Drink | 12 comments | RSS feed | Trackback >

12 Responses to “Holiday Gift Suggestions”

  1. 1.   Egaeus Says:
    December 18th, 2008 at 3:32 pm

    And here i was going to get one or two of their chocolate samplers for the office Christmas party tomorrow. I may now have to reconsider. :)

  2. 2.   Sean Says:
    December 18th, 2008 at 3:37 pm

    It is the first element.

  3. 3.   Julianne Says:
    December 18th, 2008 at 3:40 pm

    I’m going to try to make bacon chocolate truffles, with a light dusting of sea salt.

  4. 4.   D'Arcy Norman Says:
    December 18th, 2008 at 3:46 pm

    That bacon looks a little green, doesn’t it? at least it’s naturally smoked…

  5. 5.   Julianne Says:
    December 18th, 2008 at 3:58 pm

    Bacon is practically is a vegetable.

  6. 6.   greg Says:
    December 19th, 2008 at 7:41 am

    i’m totally trying this out the next time i buy some bacon. i’ll probably include eggs as well, just to up the cholesterol content

  7. 7.   astropixie Says:
    December 19th, 2008 at 8:10 am

    the bag o bacon paired with the bananas in the photo really adds to the wholesomeness of the bacon!

  8. 8.   Michael Bacon Says:
    December 19th, 2008 at 8:54 am

    I’m glad to see people are taking this post with appropriate seriousness.

  9. 9.   The_other_white_meat Says:
    December 19th, 2008 at 9:53 am

    Pork’s Dirty Secret

    May I recommend instead organic kobe pork? The piglet is raised with tender care, fed the choicest sprouts and organic vegetables, fattened on beer and given a daily hour-long massage right up until the day of slaughter. Choice – and only ten grand.

  10. 10.   The_other_white_meat Says:
    December 19th, 2008 at 10:02 am

    P.S. Kirkland Signature is a Costco brand, right? Costco buys its pork from Smithfield (Smithfield Hams at Costco, on sale today!) – yes, they do… and the thing about Smithfield and industrial pork production is this (or clink the link above):

    “From Smithfield’s point of view, the problem with this lifestyle is immunological. Taken together, the immobility, poisonous air and terror of confinement badly damage the pigs’ immune systems. They become susceptible to infection, and in such dense quarters microbes or parasites or fungi, once established in one pig, will rush spritelike through the whole population. Accordingly, factory pigs are infused with a huge range of antibiotics and vaccines, and are doused with insecticides. Without these compounds — oxytetracycline, draxxin, ceftiofur, tiamulin — diseases would likely kill them. Thus factory-farm pigs remain in a state of dying until they’re slaughtered. When a pig nearly ready to be slaughtered grows ill, workers sometimes shoot it up with as many drugs as necessary to get it to the slaughterhouse under its own power. As long as the pig remains ambulatory, it can be legally killed and sold as meat.”

    Parts is parts. Crumbly and well-cooked? Ugggghhhh….

  11. 11.   Ginger Yellow Says:
    December 19th, 2008 at 1:32 pm

    I remember that article from when it came out. The following is probably the grimmest passage of writing I’ve ever encountered:

    “The lagoons themselves are so viscous and venomous that if someone falls in it is foolish to try to save him. A few years ago, a truck driver in Oklahoma was transferring pig shit to a lagoon when he and his truck went over the side. It took almost three weeks to recover his body. In 1992, when a worker making repairs to a lagoon in Minnesota began to choke to death on the fumes, another worker dived in after him, and they died the same death. In another instance, a worker who was repairing a lagoon in Michigan was overcome by the fumes and fell in. His fifteen-year-old nephew dived in to save him but was overcome, the worker’s cousin went in to save the teenager but was overcome, the worker’s older brother dived in to save them but was overcome, and then the worker’s father dived in. They all died in pig shit. “

  12. 12.   Ben Says:
    December 20th, 2008 at 2:32 pm

    Periodic Table of Condiments: http://www.backtable.org/~blade/fnord/condiments.html

    The reactivities are arranged more rationally in this table than the other one.





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