Baconfest Chicago 2012

Yes, you read it right. BACONFEST. My first time attending this wonderful event along with some alums Ang and D and another newbie Mark. This kicked off Ang's 30th birthday celebration as one of Ang's fav is bacon. We attended the lunch portion with about 60 vendors at the UIC Forum. We only had about 3 hrs to stuff as much pork in our bellies, but man...was it worth it! At the end, we were all sitting on the ground waiting for the raffles to be called, but most of all resting bc we still had dinner and dancing later in the evening. One of my favs and I think the group's too is May St. Cafe's bacon flan with double chocolate flan with cherry-smoked bacon, rum-cured cherries with berries. These were small bites that you could literally just pop one or more in your mouth. We had about 5 each, ha! One of the unique ones was bacon cheesecake. Here's the run down of what we had, which follow the order of the pics as well: 1. Big Jones: bacon fat biscuit with crispy bacon, pea gravy and piccallili 2. La Madia: Bruschette of bacon lardon, spinach, balsmic and ricotta salata 3. Paddy Longs: Bacon grenades - mini bacon bombs beer-battered and deep fried 4. Chicago q - Smoked Bacon Baklava ---this was amazing!! 5. Peninsula Hotel: crispy pork belly, schupf nudel, sauerkraut - looks like lechon kawali! 6. Chalkboard: bacon and eggs 7. Union Sushi + BBQ: panko bacon with baby arugula salad served with a bacon redution and house tonkatsu sauce 8. Lillie's Q: "Bacon on Bourbon Street" - bacon custard filled bacon beignet with a Cafe Du Monde coffee and chicory bacon syrup 9. Piece: Bacon pizza 10. Zed451: bacon pancake pops in a bourbon glaze 11. Pure Kitchen: arabica coffee-cured bacon, black olive puree, scotch and coffee crunch, peppermint 12. May St. Cafe: the bacon flan! 13. The Drum & Monkey serving Bakon Vodka 14. Templeton Rye serving The Rusty Doorhinge...this was so refreshing!