Bacon Addiction



"I love bacon. I mean I really love it. Good American bacon -- the crunchy kind, not that flabby stuff you get in other countries. At the risk of offending entire religions and regions, I think much of the unrest in the world is because too many people don't know the joy of bacon. Almost no one who has tasted bacon would willingly blow themselves up or start shooting at someone else. Bacon is worth living for."

- Tony Chor

There are many addictive foods, like chocolate and deep-fried foods, but when it comes to meat, the pig seems to reign supreme, especially when it comes to those special strips of heaven: bacon.

Bacon isn't healthy, unless you count the cheap substitutes like soy bacon, turkey bacon or -- (shudder) -- Canadian bacon. The odor of cooking bacon can drive some people to strange behavior with its amazingly addictive qualities.

While ham and pork chops also qualify under the trope, only bacon tips the three chief sensors of gustatory pleasure: fattiness, saltiness and sweetness. So bow ye down before bacon, the perfect meat. (Unless you're Muslim, kosher-keeping Jewish, Seventh-day Adventist or - God help you - vegetarian.)

NOTE: Turkey bacon, while not made from its succulent cousin, is still delicious and a nice alternative for the groups above...except those damn hippie celery chompers. The same holds true for certain types of beef bacon, particularly when made from plate steak, which is even more like the porcine equivalent (having lots of streaky fat that melts and fries the meat, plus anything else you care to put in the pan afterward), although it's rather harder to find (only a few halal meatpackers make the stuff).

NOTE: No such thing as "fresh bacon"! Bacon is a processed food (namely, salted), plus the only difference between it and ham is the way in which it's cut.

And no, this does not mean addiction to Kevin Bacon (although who would debate it?), nor is it related to Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon.

The Wiki Rule Can be found here.

Advertising
"Dog: IT'S BACON!
 * TV commercials for Beggin Strips brand of dog treats.

PA: No, it's Beggin Strips. Dogs don't know it's not bacon."

"Kibo: 'DOGS ARE SO STUPID THEY'LL EAT THIS JUNK!'"
 * As Steve of The Sneeze discovered, either they're counting on dogs having a very poor sense of taste, or on humans never bothering to try. (Probably the latter).


 * How does KFC make their famous bowl better? They put bacon on it.

Literature

 * In the Discworld novels, Sam Vimes' Trademark Favorite Food is a bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwich. Preferably with as little lettuce and tomato as possible. There's also a brief mention in Unseen Academicals of a perfect bacon sandwich being found in the Cabinet of Curiosity.

Live-Action TV
""Kate Moss said 'Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels.' Said the rest of the world, 'Bacon.'""
 * On The Office, Micheal Scott loves bacon so much it even lead to him cooking his foot on a George Forman Grill. Makes Sense in Context.
 * Martin Crane from Frasier is also addicted to bacon. He is less than pleased by the all-veggie substitution after his heart attack, "Fake-on".
 * Top Chef: If a "cheftestant" uses bacon in a dish, some judge is bound to say, "Bacon is always a good idea," or the like. Makes you wonder why they don't use it more often.
 * A joke from SNL's Weekend Update section:

"Eric: Mmm, bacon..."
 * Stargate Atlantis: The episode "The Storm" features a couple of extras discussing how the one thing they wish they'd brought along to Atlantis was bacon.
 * America's Test Kitchen: In one episode they replaced butter with smoked bacon in an alternative Thanksgiving Turkey recipe because, and I quote one of the chefs, "We thought about bacon because, hey, everything tastes better with bacon."
 * ICarly: Bacon is one of Big Eater Sam's favorite foods.
 * In Smart Guy, one of the characters will always wake up if there is bacon cooking. Always.
 * In one episode of the French comedy show Palace, the restaurant of the eponymous Palace runs out of bacon, and the patrons are growing restless (one would say, in withdrawal). The whole thing is played up as a parody of Disaster Movies, with the experienced cordon bleu chef giving advices by phone, the kitchen exploding at one point for some reason and the heroic former-army-cook saving the day.
 * That 70s Show has Red having to give up bacon after suffering a stroke.
 * He doesn't.


 * All to frequently inverted on Chopped when one of the contestants incorporates bacon into a dish but commits the sin of undercooking it. This also happens on the numerous occasions when various international versions of bacon appear in the mystery basket (Chopped has an odd obsession with all forms of cured, fatty pork).
 * In an episode of Will and Grace, while Will is cooking breakfast he tries to wake up Grace, when he fails to do so he just says: "I´m making bacon" she quickly got up half-asleep muttering "I want it crispy!
 * In another episode Grace complaints to Will the there is no bacon, he replies saying that he just bought bacon, then Grace responds yelling "TURKEY BACON IS NOT REAL BACON!"
 * In No Reservations, Anthony Bourdain often sings the praises of bacon, as well as every other conceivable part of a pig or way of cooking it.

Music

 * This.
 * The Great Luke Ski has a song about how much he likes bacon. The same site features Tom Smith's out-of-genre cover.
 * Meekakitty's The Bacon Song

New Media
"Uber loves all things bacon, including bacon doughnuts, bacon flavored-mayonnaise, bacon-flavored envelopes. They celebrated finishing the game with bacon-flavored vodka!"
 * Trademark Favorite Food of the internet, especially Something Awful.
 * The Straight Dope Message Board not only loves bacon, but it has found something even more wonderful than bacon: the almighty Bacon Salt.
 * Uber Entertainment, developers of Monday Night Combat, love bacon.


 * ThinkGeek is extremely fond of bacon. They sell bacon everything.
 * My First Bacon!
 * EPICMEALTIME is all over this trope.

Newspaper Comics

 * Zits: "Dad seems a lot happier since they started making bacon-flavoured cholesterol medication."
 * Garfield: "I LOVE BACON!!!"

Stand-up Comedy

 * Jim Gaffigan bases an entire routine upon his love for bacon.

Video Games

 * Psychonauts: Ford Cruller loves bacon, and Raz can use a strip of it to summon Cruller for advice and hints.
 * Gears Of War 2: It has a storyline-related achievement parodying this: Better Wrapped in Beacon
 * In 3, a stranded survivor offers to trade a side of bacon for Samantha. Baird urges Cole to take the deal.
 * While that may be Baird being his usual smartass self (he has something of a snarking rivalry with Samantha) Clayton Carmine in the same scene demonstrates a longing for bacon that is referenced later in the game. This actually makes sense in a sad sort of way as humanity's lot has gotten so bad because of the Locust War that simple food products are now a delicacy.
 * Death Spank: "A tale of blood, and steel, and bacon."
 * The sequel is appropriately called, The Baconing.
 * Plants vs. Zombies: Crazy Dave loves bacon so much that he's willing to pay 1000 dollars for a single strip. Why would he do that? Because he's craaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaazy!
 * Halo Wars: The game has an Achievement named 'Everything's Better With Bacon', which was almost this trope's name.
 * Commander Keen has the Bean-With-Bacon Rocketship.
 * A meme on Something Awful decrees that all real men must bring nothing but bacon and grandfather clocks on their Oregon Trail runs.
 * In Monday Night Combat, Bacon makes you better at everything, just like in real life.
 * World of Warcraft: A new cooking quest is called "Everything Is Better With Bacon".
 * In Dragon Fable, Bacon is one of the Elements.
 * Referenced in Kid Icarus: Uprising, where offhandedly says that  are like bacon; they taste good with anything.

Web Comics

 * Three Panel Soul: Is this bacon ice cream? IT'S BACON ICE CREAM!
 * Xkcd: This strip is about bacon.
 * Sandra and Woo: August 16 comic.
 * Penny Arcade's collection, Attack of the Bacon Robots.
 * The power of bacon is an established part of Nedroid canon:
 * The perfect bacon
 * Finally, A Reason to Go On

Web Original

 * In Red vs. Blue, Grif had to undergo a lot of surgery (using Simmons' leftover body parts from after his own reconstruction as a cyborg) after being run over by Shiela the tank. Sarge mentioned in passing that some of Grif's old parts had already "atrophied from a lifetime diet of HooHoos and bacon-flavoured marshmallows".
 * EPICMEALTIME does a lot with bacon. A lot. Virtually every recipe involves cocooning, candying, and/or weaving bacon in one way or another.
 * Several LOLcats pages, most notably this page and this page.
 * In TV Tropes Will Ruin Your Life, Dash and Eric use bacon to reunite the Five-Man Band.
 * Found loves his bacon. To the point where he will become extremely depressed and anti-social whenever the fridge is void of all signs of bacon.
 * All three main riffers from Riff Trax love bacon, although Mike Nelson is absolutely obsessed with it. Two of their best shorts are "Three Magic Words" (about selling pork) and "Behavior of Domestic Pigs" (about pigs nesting), the latter of which involves all three of them shouting "Be bacon already!"
 * Mike turned his obsession Up to Eleven in February of 2009, when he vowed to eat nothing but bacon for the whole month. He stuck with this self-imposed challenge, only stopping a few days short of the 28th because his family was getting a little annoyed by the whole thing (and so he could stage a satirical "press conference").
 * The Homestar Runner Wiki has a page documenting all mentions and appearances of bacon.
 * Rhett and Link made a song called "Rub Some Bacon On It."

Western Animation
"Homer: Mmmmmmm... unexplained bacon."
 * The Simpsons
 * Homer Simpson loves bacon with everything, including Dagwood-like sandwiches with it.

"Homer: Now you listen here. You live in my house; you'll do what I tell you and you'll believe what I believe in. Now you butter up your bacon, boy!
 * When Homer wanted to get fatter to work at home, Dr. Nick Riviera advised: "Instead of using bread, use PopTarts! Instead of chewing gum, chew bacon!"
 * Another incident:

Bart: But my heart hurts.

Homer: Bacon up that sausage!"

"Homer: First you took away my Philly Fudgesteak. And then my Bacon Balls. Then my Whatchamachicken. You monster!"
 * Homer went ballistic after his local Krusty Burger stopped selling Ribwiches.

"Homer: Is it Bacon Day?"
 * In "I Love Lisa", apparently, bacon has its own day.


 * Invader Zim: "GIR! Why is there BACON IN THE SOAP?" "I made it myself!"
 * Futurama has caffeinated bacon. And baconated grapefruit.
 * 1000 years earlier, caffeinated maple-bacon lollipops had already been invented.
 * In The Fairly Odd Parents there's a popular restaurant called Cake 'N' Bacon.
 * Two of the characters from Time Squad come from a time where "there are no wars, no pollution, and bacon is good for your heart."

Real Life

 * Bacon. I mean, come on! It's bacon, man! Bacon!
 * Chocolate-covered bacon. Squee or Squick -- you decide.
 * Bacon ice cream. Or chocolate-covered bacon ice cream.
 * Back when food resources weren't as reliably available, bacon was an important food staple because it has lots of fat, salt and protein, and could keep for a long time without spoiling thanks to the curing process used to make it.
 * Supposedly the single food most likely to defeat attempted vegetarians. Like Janeane Garofalo.
 * Even cats are better with bacon.
 * Bacon sandwiches can cure hangovers since they are often caused, at least partially, by dehydration due to drinking too much alcohol. The protein and fat (especially the grease), with a glass of orange juice, may not be as fast-acting as the Hideous Hangover Cure, but it's a lot more enjoyable than drinking a glass of raw eggs, Blazing Inferno Hellfire Sauce, and goodness-knows-what-else.
 * Two entrepreneurs by the name of Justin and Dave are this trope. (Seriously. Their company's slogan is literally "Everything should taste like bacon".) They started by inventing a seasoning called Bacon Salt and have since added bacon-flavored mayonnaise, popcorn, ranch dressing, southern-style gravy, lip balm(!) and envelopes(!!). The really awesome part (besides making everything taste like bacon)? All of their products are vegetarian and certified Kosher.
 * On top of that, no calories and no fat. This is practically guilt free bacon.
 * In an example of the universe making so very much sense, they have a deal with EPICMEALTIME.
 * "We are on a quest to make everything taste like bacon." Yeah, apparently so.
 * I would eat a baby if it came with bacon., available in various sizes.
 * Restaurant franchise Denny's recently began Baconalia, a ten-week event in which they find increasingly creative ways to incorporate bacon into dishes.
 * If you can't or won't eat bacon, try eating chipotle peppers mixed with sour cream. The smoking process used to make jalapeno peppers into chipotle peppers makes them taste a bit like smoky, spicy bacon.
 * The website Neatorama.com has a whole section of their store devoted to bacon-related products.
 * Think Geek has a whole section of their website dedicated to bacon. Geeks love bacon.
 * Bacon vodka. Someone makes and sells the stuff on a commercial basis.
 * Or else try infusing your preferred alcohol with bacon.
 * In Bellingham, Washington, Rocket Donuts sells a bacon-maple bar.
 * Bacon-flavored syrup. It's actually quite tasty, and goes well with coffee.
 * Korea has Samgyeopsal, which is the same cut of pork belly meat, but uncured, and customizable to your liking.
 * M.F.K. Fisher gives a recipe from her childhood during WWI for a cake that could be made with bacon grease, to spare a household's butter or margarine ration.
 * The Kilroy was here pre-Internet Meme had a Memetic Mutation of saying "Wot, no bacon?" (reflecting the rationing in World War II), instead of "Kilroy was here".