Colored Bacon

Neil Caldwell has come up with something that is pure genius. He has created the color wheel of bacon!

No, this bacon was not a victim of photoshop. This is real colored bacon. And you can eat it! Nom, nom, nom!

In the photos above, you can see the raw bacon in their color bowls and the cooked colored bacon below it. Notice how well the color is retained? Seriously awesome!

Colored bacon strips on plate

It’s probably the most delicious rainbow we’ve ever seen. Put some golden tots at the end of this bacon rainbow and you’ll definitely get lucky. Show your Bacon Pride!

Maybe this rainbow would work if you used bacon jerky?

158 thoughts on “Colored Bacon”

  1. These youngsters will change their bacon lifestyle with the times. Let them have their fun. Maybe their children with make bacon shapes, or stand them up on the plate. Let’s keep focused here, the issue is that it’s still bacon.

    Reply
  2. First nitrates, now mysterious dying agents! Gee I wonder what new meat processing enhancement they’ll think of next……

    Reply
  3. People find it hard to get their kids to eat bacon? REALLY? I think they should take this technique and transfer it to something less appealing – like have multicolored corn or something. Maybe… rainbow SALT to season just about anything?

    Reply
  4. If this really is just bacon and moderately diluted food coloring, it probably tastes horrible. Above a relatively low concentration, food coloring makes things taste like the tip of a permanent marker.

    Reply
  5. I don’t know about this – I like my bacon au-naturel if you know what I mean. I would be concerned that the red bacon has red food coloring and isn’t that carcinogenic?

    Reply
  6. Don’t hate-this is diversity in bacon! Can’t all colors get along-alongside the eggs on my breakfast plate?

    this is perfect for a halloween themed breakfast, but only if flavor isn’t compromised by the “secret recipe”

    Reply
  7. Just because it is colorful will not make a child eat it, at least not any child with a bit of intelligence and self-respect. My kids would [ if they were also not smart enough to know bacon=good ] look at me like, “It’s still the stuff I didn’t want to eat… only now it’s colorful”. Maybe “parenting” is an option???

    Reply
  8. Doesn’t look pleasing… we should stop eating junk i guess.. Bacon isn’t junk.. color it, it becomes junk. scary bacon!

    Reply
  9. That’s awesome! I NEED to figure this out if he’s not tellin! Every year for at least the last 28, my family has green eggs & ham for St. Patricks day dinner! We usually do scrambled with the bacon (as the ‘ham’) thrown in because you couldn’t dye it! This is epic!

    Reply
  10. If I had to guess, I’d say the coloring was added during the curing process, or at least as a marinade or brine.

    Not real unusual, but this is the first time I’ve seen it applied to bacon.

    Reply
  11. Just because you CAN, doesn’t mean you should. On a personal level, I find this repugnant in appearance and strongly suspect it will also dye a person’s mouth bright Ick. Not to mention the flavor issue, which others have brought up. Pass, and thanks for playing “what stupid $&#! can we do to food items today?”

    Reply
  12. Homer: I’ll have the smiley face breakfast special. Uhh, but could you add a bacon nose? Plus bacon hair, bacon mustache, five o’clock shadow made of bacon bits and a bacon body.
    Waitress: How about I just shove a pig down your throat?
    (Homer looks excited)
    Waitress: I was kidding.
    Homer: Fine, but the bacon man lives in a bacon house!
    Waitress: No he doesn’t!

    Reply
  13. same thing with green eggs, ham and green beer on st pattys day… doesnt change the taste, only the color coming out the other end.

    Reply
  14. I will eat green eggs and bacon.
    I will eat them, I’m not fakin’.
    I will eat them down in Hell.
    I will eat them with Neil Caldwell.
    I will eat green eggs and bacon!
    And a green martini, stirred not shaken.

    Reply
  15. “Ever had trouble getting your kids to eat their meat?” No. Who has ever had trouble getting their kid to eat meat, ESPECIALLY BACON? And if their kid doesn’t want to eat meat, who cares? Bacon isn’t a required food group, it’s a luxury item. It’s also not very good for you. Not wanting to eat bacon doesn’t sound like something to be overcome, it sounds like something to be praised.

    Also, food coloring additives are harmful to your health, and often cause or irritate food allergies. Your graphic designer friend could use some food science classes before he goes around poisoning everyone with his “art”.

    Reply
  16. Well, all these guys did was copy Sponge Bob. Goolgle search “Sponge Bob Pretty Patties”.

    I’d eat colored bacon.

    Reply
  17. Ellen said:
    “Maybe… rainbow SALT to season just about anything?”

    Mentally I just made my first million. Thanks, Ellen :O)

    Reply
  18. Can I just mention that American bacon is no good for you. British bacon is virtually all meat whereas US bacon is usually one processed strip of fat, ooh my arteries!

    Reply
  19. One more thing when I don’t die a horrible fat, heart attack u will relish in the fact that I didn’t eat bacon

    Reply
  20. Just an after thought.. if the kids aren’t going to eat their “meat” as the article says… so be it, that means more for us.

    Reply
  21. I look forward to get some Hello Kitty Bacon. I’m so excited about that possibility. Just imagine: your Hello Kitty plate, fork, knife, glass, napkin… AND BACON! That’s what humanity was needing, now that I saw this I know that I’m ready to die.

    Reply
  22. “You won’t get any pudding if you don’t eat your meat! How can you have pudding if you don’t eat your meat!!”

    Thank you Pink Floyd

    Reply
  23. I think it is a great idea. It makes it so repulsive and artificial that people will give up eating that cholesterol bomb called ‘bacon’

    Reply
  24. I…just really don’t know what to say about this…seems so wrong, yet right at the same time. Ghastly might be a good word…

    Reply
  25. This is so wrong, they started with packaging our food with poisonos plastic, now colored bacon, if you simply know how to raise your kids, no need to fool them into getting sick, bacon already is not the healthiest meat. I hope you eat healthy from whats naturally available. PeACE!

    Reply
  26. there is only one way to achieve these colos and that is by food coloring, and a lot of it. Not a healthy thing to ingest too much of and by heating the bacon, what other chemical compounds are formed? Take a look at food color chemitry some day.

    Reply
  27. I couldn’t agree more with most of you on it. Not only does it look gross…But it would start my day off a little better. I mean who the heck wouldn’t want bright colored bacon on a rainy day to brighten up their day. I’m one for wearing bright colors or even seeing bright colors just to start my day off fantastical!!!

    Reply
  28. My kid will eat bacon all day long. Not that colored bacon. This is a way for them not to eat. It’s not always about the color. Veggies have colors and they get fed to the dog. LOL

    Reply
  29. And after your intestines have completed their work? I know that after eating a DQ Scooby Doo Blizzard what all the food coloring did. I would not eat that again either…..

    Reply
  30. Lets make our food a bit more artificial HUH!?!?!?!
    Our kids our going to live to the age of 40 if we keep feeding them all this artificial food !!

    Reply
  31. No, and wrong!

    The rationale is bullshit. What kid wouldn’t enjoy bacon just as it is? And if they don’t like the flavour, for some insane reason – doesn’t everyone like bacon? – why would colouring it make a difference?

    This is asinine.

    Reply
  32. I think Colorful bacon is amazing… Course then again I absolutely love rainbows. It might look disgusting… Oh but i would still try it. BACON IS AMAZING! And now that it is rainbow. Heh, well I’m just in a Colorfull heaven. And for everyone’s information. I think that calling it Gay bacon is great.. Because clearly rainbow symbolize gays, And gay people are amazingly wonderful. Woohoo Support for gays by food =) Even if it is food that makes you fat.

    Reply
  33. I doubt I’d eat the rainbow colored bacon, but I LOVED reading all the comments! Best comments on an article I’ve read in a LONG time. The bacon, however, is mildly disturbing. Interesting, but decidedly abnormal. Think I’ll pass.

    Reply
  34. He reveals his secret today at the Toronto Star
    ttp://www.thestar.com/living/article/832972–coloured-bacon-creator-reveals-his-secret?bn=1

    “Neil Caldwell marinates strips of regular supermarket bacon in baths of yellow, red, green and purple dye for from 24 to 30 hours. Then he fries the strips and – voila – red, orange, yellow, blue and purple bacon.

    Why doesn’t the colour leach out?

    β€œI have no idea,” Caldwell tells the Star, barely able to stop laughing long enough to talk.

    β€œA bit of colour does come out. The hue difference between the fat and the meat is quite noticeable.”

    Otherwise, he’s baffled. He’s a 38-year-old graphic designer who had a vision of coloured bacon one Sunday morning in a supermarket, slightly hung over, when a blue baby stroller crossed his line of vision in front of the bacon counter.

    The secret could be in the marinating, he admits. But he’s never soaked the bacon in the dye for less than 24 hours, so he’s not sure. He does know that refridgeration seems to make no difference to the final result.

    β€œVisually, it has a bit of a twist,” says Caldwell, explaining the appeal from a designer’s point of view. β€œThe colours are associated with produce: lemons, blueberries, oranges. But when you eat it, you get the earthy taste of bacon.””

    Reply
  35. this is definately kind of cool. i think it would spice up breakfast pretty well. imagine a blt. wow lots of color.lol

    Reply
  36. This is like spray painting over the Mona Lisa in primary colors to make it appeal to Andy Warhol fans. Great way to ruin God’s greatest meat creation.

    Reply
  37. >heyto Says:
    >July 8th, 2010 at 3:52 pm
    >I wish this bacon trend would die already.

    Bacon is not a trend, it is meat that is reaching its full potential, and people are finally starting to give it the recognition it deserves.

    Reply
    • the coloring of bacon is a trend dont try and act smart when clearly your not and bacon has always been popular and coloring it is a stupid trend that needs to die.

      Reply
  38. The bacon looks weird. Seeing this is remembering my College days that I ate blue sauce spaghetti. I think Neil Caldwell is studying about how humans can eat those foods that we are not actually convenient in eating when their color will change. I am 100% that these colored bacon are still pretty yummy as the bacon we usually ate! Bon Appetit!

    Reply
  39. You all need to get a life with the comments. For god sakes its bacon…with food coloring what is you problem! Whats next comments like aliens are affecting our meat with there probes!…holy crap man. I’ll say it again get a life and move on….its just bacon…smells the same…taste the same…its just a novel idea and you guys trash it like its death. Heres a novel idea if it bothers you eating the bacon,shut up and..move away from the table and let the rest of us eat it….duh!

    Reply
  40. “Ever had trouble getting your kids to eat their meat?”

    Um, no. How about a more realistic bacon-vs-kids question:

    “Ever had to banish your entire family from the kitchen to stop all the pork products from vanishing so that by the time you actually serve breakfast it’s only eggs and toast and nobody is interested?”

    Yeah, yellow bacon would definitely solve that one. “Eww, what’s wrong with the bacon?”

    Reply
  41. Alfred Hitchcock used to play games with his dinner guests – he would have his gourmet chef prepare a wonderful dinner in high classic French style, all strictly by the book except for one detail: all the food would be dyed bright electric blue. No matter how hard they tried, most could NOT eat the food.

    Reply
  42. blondy773 says:
    but… aliens ARE affecting or meat with probes. They’re out there… just wait.
    ———————

    Did you mean “our meat”, dear? Perhaps you shouldn’t bash other people’s grammar when you yourself have a poor handle on it…

    Reply
  43. This is the ideal weblog for anyone who desires to find out about this topic. You understand so significantly its virtually difficult to argue with you (not that I truth would need?HaHa). You definitely place a brand new spin on the topic thats been written about for a long time. Nice things, just exceptional!

    Reply
  44. Mr. B,

    Bacon already has a color, and it is not yellow, blue, green, or purple.
    You also state that this would be great for kids that don’t like to eat their meat. Kids might not eat meat, but I have not met one yet that won’t eat Bacon.

    Reply
  45. Lots of irate debate over colorful bacon! Food color is largely harmless if not overdone, and it certainly makes it look fun, as if you ever needed to enhance bacon. Bacon enhances everything else, but why not? Btw, bacon refers to the smoking process, and different countries use different parts of the pig to make bacon, it’s the smoke that makes it so good, as it does on all types of meat animals.Smoked duck is wonderful! Ignore the naysayers.

    Reply
  46. Nope. There are just too many horrible, pseudo-documentary, have-a-different-agenda “movies” out there to watch. Can’t se them all, can we?

    Reply
  47. After reading these comments it’s really obvious that there are a lot of uptight people with nothing better to do than bag on bacon on a bacon website. People, get a life. Maybe bacon has some mood-altering effect that would make even the most holier-than-thou critic relax and enjoy life. These nutcases are only a whisper away from the conspiracy theorists, religious zealots, and anti-everything activists with some overwhelming need to “educate” those who actually understand but couldn’t care less about their tired speeches.

    Lighten up, people. It’s bacon. If you don’t like it, don’t eat it. But go preach on some other site.

    Reply
  48. Love this!!! It’s fun, it’s cool, and I know my kids will love it. Usually, we do green eggs and ham every now and then. Next time, we’ll do green eggs and bacon.

    Reply
  49. I agree, Those of us who love bacon can not be swayed by the naysayers, who should stop preaching about how it’s bad for you. If you think people should not eat bacon, go stick your face in a plate of tofu and leave us alone.

    Reply
  50. Neil Caldwell has come up with something that is pure genius. He has created the color wheel of bacon!

    No, this bacon was not a victim of photoshop. This is real colored bacon. And you can eat it! Nom, nom, nom!

    Reply
  51. “Anyone feeding dyed bacon to their children should be investigated by CPS immediantly. Forget investigating them, they should remove the children immediantly.”
    Would you mind telling us all exactly *why* you think this should happen? Do you really believe this, or was your ‘opinion’ invented purely to annoy us?
    I’d really love to know.
    –S

    Reply

Leave a Comment