Bacon Tasting Part II

Sunday I cooked up a slice of the "Newsom's Old Mill Store Hickory Smoked Country Bacon" for Chris who promptly swooned under it's influence. He even went so far as to try and lock me in my shed so as to get the rest of the bacon. I served the rest as a desert after dinner to several members of my family. all who tried it liked it (yes some people refused to try it).

This morning I cooked up a batch of "Dan Philips Special Brown Sugar Hickory Smoked Country Bacon". My initial reaction was one of a let down. I may have over cooked it a little, and mixed with eggs and toast, didn't allow the full flavor to come through.. Kathi reported it wasn't her favorite, and tasted sour. I thought it was very salty. However just a few minutes ago I cooked up a small batch for tasting purposes.

Here is The grateful palates description:
Artisan: Gatton Farms
Tasting Notes: This is my own, secret, private cure. Only Charlie Gatton and I know the recipe. I set out to custom design the perfect bacon and I think this is it. It has an incredible balance between sweet, hammy pork flavors and salty, savory flavors. The flavors are intense and the meat is succulent. A bold new bacon that stands up and says 'Eat me!'

My review:
This bacon is not as heavily smoked as the previous review, but it is definitely more smoked than your run-o-the mill bacon. one thing I have noticed with these Bacon's (so far) is that when cooked they shrink but they do not curl. Thus making for even cooking. anyways... This bacon has a nice smoked flavor, the ham flavor is more apparent then the previous bacon. The bacon is sweeter than the previous but I would not be able to identify the sweetness as coming from brown sugar. The bacon is salty and the saltiness varies with the width of the bacon. The narrow sections of the bacon are very salty and the wider ends are more sweat. This bacon is slightly more chewy than the first one. Personally I would expect a bacon with the words "Brown Sugar" to have a prevalent brown sugar/molasses taste which it does not. At times the hickory flavor explodes from the bacon and other times it is not as strong. All in all a good bacon.