Bacon butties

I have a friend who's been vegetarian for as long as I've known her and that's nearly 50 years. Back in the 1970s she said that the one thing that had made her waiver, when she first stopped eating meat, was the smell of cooking bacon. 

Bacon sandwiches are a bit of a Thompson family tradition at Christmas time. I like them best with white, flat bread, with butter and with the bacon tending towards crispy. Bacon sandwiches are easy enough to buy in bars in Spain though they're not entirely to specification. They usually come in baguette type bread and, when I order one, I'm usually asked if I want "just" bacon which Spaniards find a little odd; the usual suggestion from the server is to add a little fried cheese or at least some mayo. There is only one remaining chain of fast food sandwich shops in the shopping centres of Spain and they sell lots of bacon rolls from basic ones with just cheese added through to ones that are full of crispy chicken, lettuce, tomato, BBQ and tomato sauce. 

When we lived in Ciudad Rodrigo we used the, now sadly closed, Jamonería cafetería Castilla. The first time we went in there we were met by the unmistakable smell of frying bacon. They were serving the bacon on toast. I asked for a bacon toast. "It's not bacon," said the waiter, "it's papada." I didn't know the word papada so he mimed; it translates as double chin or jowl. It still tasted good.

Anyway, New Year's Day today so bacon sandwiches were the order of the day. I'd bought lots of bacon before the holiday including some from our local supermarket branded with the Union Flag and promising prime British back bacon. It wasn't cheap. When I fried it up on Christmas Day lots of white liquid formed a scum on the bacon. Obviously it was bacon injected with water to make it look juicier. I drained off the water added a drop of oil and fried it up again. It tasted fine but the experience was a bit disappointing. The packet I opened this morning was the more usual Spanish style smoked streaky bacon. This stuff is cheap. It looks cheap. It's produced by huge food conglomerates like Oscar Mayer (Kraft Heinz I think) and by big local companies like el Pozo or Selva. It does not inspire confidence. As I fried it up fat in the bacon melted and the bacon fried "naturally" without extra oil or fat. It tasted better than the British bacon. It reminded me of those packets and packets of ready prepared stuff we'd seen at the British supermarket the other day. A sad reflection on modern food I thought.