Bakin' Bacon

The non-competitive side of our recent Super Bowl par-tay was equally delicious. The main attraction were the meat-popsicles my dad made. He spent weeks carefully refining the recipe stole the recipe from some contest winner on the Food Network website, and we could definitely see why the recipe won. Ground pork, Bacon!, and green onion, dipped in a sweet chili sauce. Genius.

The double pork meatballs were skewered on a stick of lemongrass, which begged the question: which came first, the lemon or the lemongrass? And furthermore, why isn't there more grasses and fruits that taste alike? What makes the lemon so special? I'd skewer all sort of stuff with banana-grass sprigs. Or a stalk of peach-grass. Someone needs to go science those into existence.

As paninis were on the menu, I made some focaccia...

...and ciabatta...

Whenever I bake bread, I'm always pleasantly surprised when the dough actually rises. Since yeast is so fickle, I usually just expect it to collapse into a dense mass or turn purple and sprout wings. However, if the above ciabatta bread turned into a purple winged thing, I'd probably still grill it up nicely with some turkey and cheese. It was fantastic.

-Isaac