What with obsessing over the replacement refs (hey, a guy has to have priorities) and interviewing the first batch in the horde of candidates for the November election, I fear I may have missed some major news events I should have blogged about this week. But I'm certainly glad I caught this one, and all I can say is, "Whew!"
Even though headlines for the past couple of days screamed, “Bacon shortage!” (including one of our own) and social media blew up with jokes about the impending “porkocalypse,” it's all a lot of oinking over nothing.
The summer drought, and rising corn prices have hurt hog farmers for sure. Soy, a component of hog meal, is also costing more, driven by ravenous demand by China. But all that will only lead to bacon being temporarily more expensive, not an outright “shortage.”
“It's a challenging time because of drought for both consumers and producers and food costs will rise,” Cindy Cunningham of the National Pork Board told NBC News, but we're “not going to see people in line for bacon... there will be no bacon rationing.”
"No bacon rationing." Is there a sweeter phrase in the universe?
Say, remember when it took weeks or even months to get a good urban legend started and sometimes years to debunk one? These days, we can get freaked out over something we see online at breakfast and have the whole scare dismissed by lunchtime. Love the new digital reality.
My favorite new thing to do with bacon, by the way, is to crumble a little in with the yokes, mayo and mustard for deviled eggs. And use brown, spicy mustard instead of yellow. And try sprinkling Old Bay on top instead of paprika. Oh, and for variety, a little grated Parmesan wouldn't hurt.
