Bacon-Flavored Brews

Nothing permeates the air and causes a knawing in one's stomach quite like the sweet scent of sizzling bacon. So it's easy to understand why cooks across the country put bacon on sandwiches, crumble it on top of baked potatoes and even wrap meat in it. The latest bacon craze comes not as a meal, but as a brew.

An article in the New York Times explores America's new fascination with bacon-flavored beer. (Only in America would we add meat that cooks in its own fat to an already high-calorie drink, right?). The bacon-y brew has showed up at Brooklyn Brewery, Chicago's David Burke's Primehouse and Washington's Front Street Ale House on San Juan Island. The beer is even being served at a dinner at Per Se, one of New York City's most expensive restaurants. Who knew bacon and beer could suddenly become so high-brow?

The beer can be made by a few different methods. One of them involves mixing aged ale with lumps of bacon fat, freezing the fat into a solid and then filtering it out so the beer retains the salty-smoky flavor sans visible chunks. Another method involves suspending oven-dried bacon in a pale ale.

But however you make it, most would agree that bacon and beer are two great tastes -- if they taste great together, even better.

Photo courtesy of stock.xchng.