The bacon that ruined my life.

The deep freezer contains many wonderful mysteries. As a family of 6 with young kids who eat like 16 year old teenage boys, we go through a crazy amount of food in a month. Without the deep freezer I think we would need to set up camp in the grocery store across the street.

Sometimes digging into the depths of this white, cold box brings fully cooked freezer meals of awesomeness that save time and sanity, but other times you pull out a dud. Last night was one of those times.

My parents are often my meat supplier because as retired military they can still access the rock bottom prices of groceries at a local military base. I decided to use one of these meat gifts for breakfast this morning and threw it into the fridge to thaw last night as I headed out to a last minute date night, equally excited about time with the hubs and breakfast the next morning.

Today when I woke up I remembered, "WE ARE HAVING BACON!!!" For those of you who don't know, bacon and I have quite the love affair. I've even been given the nickname "Bacon Whore" by theatre friends because that is how deep this thing goes. It's a thing. Don't judge.

Now, as an actress who rehearses and performs at night, mornings are not my friend. That being said, my darling, way-too-good-to-me, husband makes breakfast for my kiddos and I stumble out of bed to scoop out the pre-cooked breakfast for the two youngest. He was the bacon cook this morning.

I walked into the living room to the smells of delicious pig fat in the air and as I round the corner to the kitchen I could see that something was not quite right. The bacon looked weird. Normally we are a crispy bacon kind of family but when I beheld the plate that contained my treasure, it looked fatty and slightly petrified. The look alone should have dissuaded me from putting it into my mouth or the fact that my bacon-loving school kids had left it on their plates before heading to school, but as a true bacon follower I disregarded all logic and obeyed the uncontrolled desire to consume it.



As the substance that I thought was bacon touched my lips, I realized that something horrible had happened. Thoughts raced through my head.

WHY WOULD SOMEONE MAKE BACON LIKE THIS?

DO THEY HATE US? DO THEY HATE LIFE ITSELF?

BECAUSE THAT IS THE ONLY EXPLANATION FOR WHY SOMEONE WOULD DESTROY SOMETHING SO SACRED.

So I texted all of this to my husband and the poor guy wrote back that he actually ate this strange pork substance! He said the package actually said uncured pork bellies. What, the what?!?! Why? What does that even mean? Why would you NOT cure it if you knew that curing this same exact belly fat would make bacon? Why waist such a luscious piece of meat by not curing it?

I spit this abomination of bad meat packer foder into the garbage because I couldn't take it. And I'm not one to spit food out! I'm the girl who eats the skunk spray jelly bean when playing Bean Boozled. Food should not be waisted, but what lay upon my tongue was not food.

Needless to say, I'm now skeptical about the very nectar of life: bacon. Can it be redeemed after this experience? I'm honestly not sure. And I'm appalled that the military community has to put up with this terrible product. America owes you an apology and free bacon for life!