Bacon Connoisseurs' Week

For all of you bacon sarnie lovers out there, this is your week! Today is the beginning of 'Bacon Connoisseurs' Week, encouraging people across the nation to join "the great bacon revolution". The campaign marks the importance of good quality bacon, which can only be obtained from good quality pork. 

Imported pork from countries such Holland, comes from farms which are run like a pig conveyor belt, where most of the animals haven't even seen daylight before they are sent to their fate. Before transportation to Britain, the pork is injected with water to increase the weight in order up the price. As a result, we are not only being ripped off, but the meat we are buying is tasteless and lacks flavour. Apart from our local butchers across Britain, Waitrose is the only supermarket to solely stock British bacon, which given the number of supermarket chains around, is an outrageous statistic. The objective of Bacon Connoisseurs' Week is to celebrate British pig farming, starting with a search to discover the finest bacon in THIS country. In doing so, the farmers behind the campaign hope to educate the nation towards bacon, exploring the variety of cuts and cured options available. 

So this week, lets all look beyond our favourite breakfast ingredient and support this marvelous campaign - http://www.lovepork.co.uk

Ten things you never new about bacon:

1. The British spend around £1.37billion a year on bacon, eating 227,000 tonnes of it.

2. More than 10 bacon sandwiches are eaten every second on average in the UK.

3. According to the latest survey, 46% of people like to grill bacon while 37% fry it.

4. When Julius Caesar landed in Britain in 55BC, he bought his own bacon with him - this was before he discovered the British stuff!!

5. The earliest known record of a British breakfast of bacon and eggs dates back to 1560.

6. The word 'bacon' comes from the same root as 'back' and was originally a general term for pork meat, especially when it came from the pig's back.

7. Henry IV, Part 1 and Merry Wives Of Windsor are Shakespeare's only plays that mention bacon.

8.The earliest known reference to 'streaky bacon' is in Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist.

9. George Orwell wrote of a 'bacon sandwich' in 1931, but the first mention of a 'bacon sarnie' in print was in the Daily Express on August 21, 1986.

10. The Archie McPhee novelty company in the US sells bacon soap, bacon candy, bacon floss and bacon air freshener among other bacon products.

Phrase for photography: Google