[olug] OT: bacon s'getti sauce

[Thomas D. Williamson]

Actually bacon like products are regularly used in Italian cooking  
pancetta, is a cured but unsmoked pork meat similar to bacon. It is  
used in Bolognaise Sauce. Proscuitto, a cured ham is also used in some  
sauces. Both of these are salt cured and impart salt flavors to the  
sauces. An American version of a Carbonara Sauce starts by rendering  
finely diced bacon in butter. Once that is done milk is added to the  
bacon and butter. After the milk is incorporated, a bit of vinegar is  
added to the bacon, butter and milk. This turns the milk into a gooey  
cheese like substance. This is cooked until it becomes more like runny  
cheese. The mixture is then tossed with hot pasta, and then tossed  
with some beaten eggs and Parmesan cheese. Add some black pepper and  
serve with more Parmesan cheese. This way you get bacon and eggs in a  
dinner without it looking like a breakfast meal. It is thought that  
the Carbonara came from fatty pork being smoked over a grill on an  
open fire before rendering it in the butter.

Tom Williamson


Quoting Jennifer Frasier <wookieburgers at gmail.com>:

> Hmm. I think the problem might be that bacon isn't salt. I have about a
> million tomato sauce recipes. None of them call for bacon; they all call for
> salt.
>
> I may be the only one who will take this email seriously, but I think if you
> feel you must add bacon to your spaghetti sauce, cook it separately from all
> the other ingredients and try to get as much grease off of it as possible,
> even pat it with a paper towel. That might help reduce the slimy feeling,
> but I wouldn't omit anything but meat from the sauce recipe to do it. Salt
> is pretty important to the taste, and leaving it out will make the sauce
> bland, especially if it's all you're adding besides it is tomatoes and meat.
> You can substitute other seasonings to make the sauce more flavorful, like
> garlic, cilantro, oregano, bay leaves, etc, but I still would recommend
> adding a bit of salt. Bacon is going to make the whole thing heavy, and I
> don't know a way around that besides using less. 2-3 strips is kind of a
> lot, especially with all the other meat. I assume you're using ground beef,
> but bacon is much heavier than ground beef, so I do think it could have a
> large impact. Did you reduce the amount of meat when adding the bacon? I'd
> recommend adjusting the amount of meat down to compensate, even reducing it
> more than just by the amount of bacon you are adding. You might also try
> making the sauce as usual, then tossing the bacon in right at the end when
> you're throwing the sauce and pasta together. In concept, bacon and tomatoes
> should work together, or we wouldn't have the BLT, but bacon and spaghetti
> sounds gross to me. Good luck.
>
> On Mon, Oct 6, 2008 at 10:30 AM, Will Langford <unfies at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Don't do it!
>> Heavily off topic, but men and geeks love bacon... and bacon is my favorite
>> vegetable ( http://dieselsweeties.com/archive.php?s=931 ) ... and everyone
>> loves my s'getti sauce. <http://dieselsweeties.com/archive.php?s=931>
>>
>> I substituted 2-3 strips of diced up bacon for salt just before setting the
>> sauce down to simmer for 2 hours.  The sauce ended up extra bland,
>> extremely
>> heavy on the stomach (still dealing with it this morning), and *tasted*
>> slimy although the texture was fine.  And the sauce itself is made up of 4
>> cans of 28oz tomatoes and 2-3lbs of meat... so 2-3 strips shouldn't have
>> had
>> *that* much of an impact :(.
>>
>> Now, bacon wrapped hot dogs do alright.  Here at work I bought a stainless
>> steel hot dog roller (8-12 dog, $75).  Toothpick some bacon around a hot
>> dog
>> and throw it on the rollers.  Yum.
>>
>> -Will
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>
>
>
> --
> I'm an English major. You do the math.
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