Everything's Better with Bacon!!!!!!!!

It should be my motto and thanks to the WONDERFUL people at Zingerman's Bakehouse in Ann Arbor, MI I can, with a pre-order on special weekends, get their Pepper Bacon Farm Bread. Trust me folks, this stuff leaves the bag greasy and you get bacon flavor from their applewood smoked pepper bacon in every bite. Tip: toast it and then spread it with butter ('scuse me a moment I have to go put on a clean shirt and change my panties).

When I got married my (now ex) husband asked sometime during our first year of marriage if there was anything that I made that didn't have butter, bacon fat or mayonaise in it. After a moment to whirl through my mental recipe rolodex I said, "NO!" It's my fault for marrying a Yankee. So here's my favorite bacon based recipe - it actually has two of my ex's list; bacon and mayo.

Tomato Bacon Salad:

1 pound of bacon, cooked until crisp - reserve.
1 pound of pasta cooked and cooled - I prefer radiatore but macaroni will do nicely.
tomatoes - fresh off the vine and diced
salt and pepper to taste
mayo to taste (anywhere from 1/4 to 2 cups depending on how many tomatoes and how closely you're watching your fat intake)

Dice the tomatoes, add salt, pepper, and mayonaise and put in the fridge to macerate for an hour or two.

When you're ready to serve dish the pasta onto the plate, spoon the tomato/mayo mixture over it and sprinkle the crisp bacon over the top. Be prepared to have at least 2 helpings.

I've tried mixing it all together ahead of time, but the pasta sucks up the sauce and the bacon gets soggy and the tomatoes start to taste metallic, so put it all together at the table - each person making their own to their own taste - and need to watch their calories and fat intake.

So... yeah.... old favorites

Talking today about some old favorites....

Napoli's Pizza in Annville, PA is a VERY old favorite. We started eating there as college kids (they delivered to the dorm) and now whenever we can we try to get back there (Am has been known to drive from MI to PA and go STRAIGHT to Naps) for some of the old stand-bys. When we were in college this place was a hole in the wall, a few tables, some HUGE beer coolers and a small counter area. Since we've graduated they've added some very nice seating areas, limited the number of beer coolers, created a bar, added plants and expanded the menu from subs and pizza to honest to Gods, home made Italian classics. They make them from scratch, half the family still only speaks Italian, and the bread, oh my soul the bread. Sorry, a little drool on the keyboard there....

The Tokyo Diner outside of Harrisburg, PA is another old favorite. Great Sushi and also a good Japanese Grill type place. Reasonable prices and the food is AMAZING. Have the Spider Roll (ignore the name - it's fried soft shell crab) - it's a religious experience!

Old Favorites and New Beginnings.....

So here were are.... a new beginning. We talked about getting this started earlier in June, but with kids graduating from high school (congrats Eric and Dominic!) and returning to Germany after their exchange year (miss you Felix!), it's taken until now to get it started. We attended the same college and became friends so long ago we don't even like to talk about it, and the one thing we've always had in common is FOOD. We differ in weight by about 200 pounds (one is about 116 the other is 316), live 500 miles apart and don't get to eat together as often as we'd like, but we'd like to share some of our favorite places - some we've loved for 20+ years, others we've discovered because of the Food Network (thanks for the tip on Blimpy's Guy!), or we've made food pilgrimages (The Lady and Son's in Savannah - didn't get a glimpse of the Lady but waddled back to the hotel happy anyway), or just found by accdident but... if we've had a great meal there we thought we should share it!

So put on the expandapants or your mu-mu and we'll try to share some of the best food we've had. And we'd love to hear about yours too.

Amber and Steph