A sneak peak at one of the speakers at the 10th Anniversary Camp Bacon Main Event on Friday, May 31 at Cornman Farms! 

Ari: Looking over your resume, you’ve done a whole lot!  If I read it right, you graduated from North Carolina A&T.  You were a “Swine Specialist” in Uganda and Tanzania. You were an intern for the Environmental Defense Fund and the Rachel Carson Council, and then later for the National Pork Council—those first two don’t really seem like they’d normally go with the latter? You’ve spoken at a mess of conferences. Oh yeah, you also created something called Swine and Design? That’s quite a life. Can you give us a bit of the Rhyne Cureton story?

Rhyne:  I want to say it started when I was probably . . . I guess in my early teenage years. I was that kid who was glued to the television, watching the Discovery Channel and Animal Planet and all that. I love animals! And that helped reinforce this idea that animals are supposed to be part of a natural environment. That animals are a part of nature. They should be in a natural environment. Because of all of that, I really embraced nature. And I started looking outside and brought home some critters and my mom would freak out.  But I had a really high appreciation for animals and the environment.

I went to North Carolina A&T as an animal science major. I went into it thinking I might be a veterinarian one day. It hadn’t dawned on me that “animal science” was also a part of agriculture. I realized it’s not just animals in the wild, it’s also farm animals. Land Grant (like N.C. A&T) colleges are designed to help you see the greater scheme of things. It’s not just farming. It’s econ, it’s research, it’s geopolitics, it’s food. It encompasses everything we do as a culture and civilization and a greater humanity. I really came to appreciate the multifaceted nature of agriculture. It really showed me what the full breadth of agriculture was, that I could play with it forever and never get bored!

I went to the USDA World Outlook Forum. It’s an event where people from all over the world come together to talk agriculture on a global policy scale. I was one of 20 undergrad students to be an essay winner. Then I realized that this agriculture thing was about the whole world. That agriculture is the center of everything. Nothing else can survive without it.

Being immersed in animal science, I started to notice that most of the employers who would come recruit were these giant multinationals. It just didn’t resonate with me . . . it didn’t connect with my childhood belief that animals were a part of nature. I realized that they were essentially preparing us for a job in an industrial model. They look at themselves as the saviors of the world . . . it was the opposite of what I’d been thinking. It’s like I’d been on two sides of the same coin. But I knew that polarizing myself wasn’t gonna help.

So I thought, OK!  I’m gonna take a gap year where I can actually experience agriculture.  Where I can get outdoors and work . . . so I worked on farms in Texas and North Carolina . . . they had cows, pigs, chickens, ducks . .  rabbits. Really diversified farms. It was really good to be able to work with livestock . . . and to see what it was like to practice what I’d been learning about. I wanted to be an advocate, but one way of advocating is to actually do the work. When you do that, you come from a position of knowledge and experience. I really wanted to make sure that I had that real life experience! While I was in Texas I had the opportunity to have a chance to raise these pigs. They were English Blacks.  

Ari: They’re the hogs that were really popular in England in the late 19th and early 20th centuries? Big hogs, with floppy, black ears, right?  

Rhyne: Those are the ones. We had a sow and a boar. It was really interesting but very rough. The property wasn’t really designed for pig farming. The people who were there didn’t really particularly like pigs . . . so no one there really knew how to raise them. They were trying, but they didn’t really know what they were doing. And meanwhile, I was trying to figure it out without any help, on the fly. They’re really intelligent animals, so it was frustrating not to be able to work with them properly. The breaking point was one hog . . . she was about 400 or 500 pounds . . . I had a ‘day off”. . . and she broke out. When I came back and I put her in the isolation tent. . . I kept checking behind myself to see her . . . she ended up charging right at the gate and lifted the whole, really heavy iron gate right off the hinge and throwing it up into the air!  It’s crazy how powerful they are!

That’s when I decided to stop, pause, and think for a bit. I just decided to love the hogs so hard that I would be able to understand them. Taking that approach, an approach of humility, allowed me to stop banging my head against the wall and realize what was going on.

A lot of the problem wasn’t the pigs at all. It was how they were being managed. So just spending time around them and seeing what their needs were . . . there’s so much more than just food and water . . . what’s the context that they’re being raised in? Some of the pigs have individual needs. What are those? Pinpointing what was wrong, not pinpointing the pig.

Ari: So how did you go from working on a Texas farm to the National Pork Board?

Rhyne: It was around that time that I had a chance to work with the National Pork Board doing social media for them. That exposed me to the “modern pig farmers.” I learned that my wording had to be very sensitive—there were words I just wasn’t allowed to use. Like I couldn’t say “Operation” or “crate.”  Those were considered negative words. That was really eye-opening. It’s not ever the kind of agriculture I want to do. So during my visit to them in Iowa, I asked, “How can I represent you when I don’t agree with a lot of what you’re doing?” I wasn’t coming from a place of malice, I was just confused. What they said was, “Look, just give us a fair chance. You see and you know what we do. And you know the heart behind what we do. Because some people think that we’re malicious or that we try to hurt animals.”  That helped me realized how important it is to build relationships even with folks who work in ways that aren’t how I would do it.

In the regenerative agriculture world, a lot of people like to demonize and polarize. But there are a lot of socioeconomic issues that big agriculture farmers help with. It’s important to make it a distinction between the two styles of agriculture, but not to the point where you’re making fun of each other or pointing fingers. It’s not just one person’s truth but what’s the greater truth, the truth that’s outside of any one person’s reality.

Ari: Sounds like a good message for the country overall right now!

Rhyne: Later, I got a chance to speak at my first conference ever. It was the National Women in Agriculture Association.  It was in Houston back in 2017. Through that, I got a chance to go to Uganda… one of the people in the presentation was the director of the organization that does work to empower East Africans through improvement of agriculture.

I learned there that it’s more about how do we work with appropriate technology . . . not just throwing tech at someone in East Africa who last season used a hand hoe. The idea was to help each village to develop itself to reinvest in the community. My work was training the pig farmers that were there. My first trip, I think, I focused too much on animal welfare. The idea of it wasn’t clicking with the farmers at all. Eventually, I realized I needed to teach in a different way to make it work. I’d never connected animal welfare to economic opportunities before. So the next time I went back to Uganda, I focused on how animal welfare is a good business practice. Then I could show them how animal welfare would help them to run their farming better. And then it really resonated with them. That let me see it at work on a really small scale!

Ari: And from there?

Rhyne: I started speaking here in the U.S. to new organic farmers. Unfortunately, a lot of them too often ignore the business end of agriculture. And because of that, a lot of ‘em are having to abandon what they’re doing . . . You can’t make good business decisions without knowing how you did last season or what you’re doing now.  

Ari: What’s a good example?  

Rhyne: Ham steak! I love ham steak. But a lot of people don’t even know what it is. And I realized that it won’t matter how much I love it, if the customer isn’t going to buy it. On the other hand, you can sell sausage a lot faster than a ham steak. And that’s what we started to teach farmers. Farmers started to realize, if they make sausage they can get more money rather than letting these undesirable cuts sit in their freezers. Starting to understand that what you do isn’t just what you’re personally interested in.  

The North Carolina Pork Council Conference has put me on their policy committee.  So hopefully we can make some changes that will have a positive impact. And I’m doing some training to become a USDA Ag Inspector. The training is crops first . . . so my connection . . . there is future organic farmer grants.  

Ari: What are you gonna talk about at Camp Bacon?

Rhyne: Kind of for me . . . being in the environment I am in regenerative agriculture, let’s be honest—there’s just a lot of white people in it. Which made me wonder, “Where’s my identity? How do I cultivate my identity within that context?” It’s a challenging situation. There are a lot of people like my mom’s generation and my grandmother’s generation. . . thinking of those black farmers . . .they warn me to stay away from it.

It can be discouraging. But just seeing that I’ve been blessed to have what I have, that I can use my ability to create a stronger network to help folks. Just sharing my journey of not having any background in agriculture. . . really finding a marriage of the commercial pig farming with regenerative agriculture, that’s a great thing!  That’s what I want to share. That there’s a way to do this that honors everyone.

Ari: I was reading Leah Penniman’s book, Farming While Black (which is very good!) and I saw you in there!

Rhyne: Leah, she had called me I think a year and a half ago—it was really crazy. She was looking for black farmers and she couldn’t find anyone . . . she found one farmer in Vermont who followed me on Instagram . . . and he said, “Wait, you don’t know ‘Pork Rhyne?’” And that’s how she and I got connected. She’s a pretty awesome person. Her work is really vital to the discussion of equity and race and embracing the things that were hard to swallow. The idea of working the land, not like we can now today with a sense of rejoicing, but rather out of fear and terror and enslavement. . . really historically divorced us, as a people, from the land. Her book helps remind people that African Americans belong in agriculture. But not just as farmhands or workers, but as business owners and farm owners. It’s trying to really turn us from victims into people who aren’t going to accept ‘what is,’ and instead put things in our own hands!

Ari: Ok, what about the project with painting and pigs?  

Rhyne: I love art! I’m a huge art appreciator! But art for me actually started out with a lot of hate. I started doing art out of bitterness towards my father. He was an artist, and the abandonment he threw me into . . . I ended up with a really unhealthy relationship with art.  But over time I let the resentment melt off me . . . and I changed my relationship with art.  Around 2017 . . . that was when I set up the program Swine and Design. There are 2.5 million people in Charlotte where I live. One of the community colleges I’m involved with has nine different campuses. I did demos and festivals on all the campuses—Swine and Design by Rhyne. The idea came from my friends. I always wanted to teach people how to paint.  And it was really interesting to do pigs as the focal point for the art . . .

We had a picture of that same pig I told you about, the big English Black that blew the gate off the hinges and I would give people paint and paper to work on and ask them to paint the pig. It was an opportunity for people to paint, of course. But covertly, I’m also getting the seeds of local food and regenerative agriculture into their minds while they’re learning to paint a pig! And in the process I got them asking questions about our food system. That allowed people to have insight that they wouldn’t have had. And I cooked bacon and sausage and ribs and they got to taste it . .. so it was the combination of all the senses in one two-hour event!  

I think next year I’ll come back to Camp Bacon again and we’ll do Swine and Design!!  

Ari: Before I wrap up here, what’s your favorite way to eat bacon?

Rhyne: With a maple glazed cake-based donut with a caramel drizzle ☺!

To get you going for Camp Bacon and to share an advance taste of what’s in her new book, The Pasta Friday Cookbook, Allison Arevalo sent along a lovely recipe: Bucatini with Corn, Pancetta and Burrata! For the pasta, the bucatini from the Rustichella folks will work well (available at the Deli or Mail Order). Burrata—mozzarella stuffed with shredded bits of mozzarella and cream—is ready and waiting at the Cream Top Shop!

Bucatini with Corn and Pancetta

Kosher salt

1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil 

8 ounces pancetta, diced

4 cups fresh or frozen and thawed corn kernels

Freshly ground black pepper

4 cloves garlic, minced

1 pound bucatini 

3 tablespoons salted butter, diced

1 1/2 pounds medium, ripe tomatoes (or a good quality bottled Italian tomato—try the Miragallo tomatoes at the Deli), coarsely chopped

1 cup coarsely chopped fresh basil leaves

1 cup breadcrumbs

12 ounces burrata, room temperature 

High-quality olive oil, for drizzling

1 Fill a 6-quart pot with water. Bring it to a boil and add 2 tablespoons of salt. While the water is coming to a boil, heat the olive oil in a large, heavy pot over medium-high heat. Add the pancetta and cook for 6 to 8 minutes, until browned and crispy. Remove the pancetta with a slotted spoon, leaving the rendered fat in the pot. Add the corn, 1 teaspoon of salt, and a few grinds of black pepper. Cook, without stirring, for 4 minutes, then stir and cook for another 3 minutes, until the corn has slightly browned. Add the garlic and cook for about 1 minute more.

2 Add the pasta to the boiling water and cook until slightly firmer than al dente, 1 minute less than what it says on the package. Using tongs, transfer the pasta to the pot with the corn. Add the pancetta, butter, tomatoes, basil, and 1/2 cup of the pasta cooking water, and toss well. Add the breadcrumbs and toss again. Add a few more tablespoons of the cooking water if it looks dry.

3 Pour into a serving dish. Tear apart the burrata and scatter it on top. Drizzle with olive oil and serve immediately.

(The Pasta Friday Cookbook, Andrews McMeel, Sept. 2019)

Jeff Roberts and I have run into each other at about a hundred conferences over the years! We’ve shared thoughts, heard each other present, eaten a meal or two together. Over the last thirty-five years, I think it’s safe to say that we’ve travelled moderately parallel paths through the culinary world! Each, of course, in his own way, but each focusing on learning about traditional food and cooking, and then sharing that learning through writing. Jeff’s book about cheese—The Atlas of American Artisan Cheese (Chelsea Green, 2007)—certainly focused on a lot of the same cheesemakers we’ve long worked with here.  

Last year his new book, Salted and Cured: Savoring the Culture, Heritage and Flavor of America’s Preserved Meats, came out—which made the man a natural for Camp Bacon.  Here’s what his publisher, Chelsea Green, said about the book:  

From country ham to coppa, bacon to bresaola.

Prosciutto. Andouille. Country ham. The extraordinary rise in popularity of cured meats in recent years often overlooks the fact that the ancient practice of meat preservation through the use of salt, time, and smoke began as a survival technique. All over the world, various cultures developed ways to extend the viability of the hunt—and later the harvest—according to their unique climates and environments, resulting in the astonishing diversity of preserved meats that we celebrate and enjoy today everywhere from corner delis to white-tablecloth restaurants.

In Salted and Cured, author Jeffrey P. Roberts traces the origins of today’s American charcuterie, salumi, and other delights, and connects them to a current renaissance that begins to rival those of artisan cheese and craft beer. In doing so, Roberts highlights the incredible stories of immigrant butchers, breeders, chefs, entrepreneurs, and other craftspeople who withstood the modern era’s push for bland, industrial food to produce not only delicious but culturally significant cured meats.

By rejecting the industry-led push for “the other white meat” and reinvigorating the breeding and production of heritage hog breeds while finding novel ways to utilize the entire animal—snout to tail—today’s charcutiers and salumieri not only produce everything from country ham to violino di capra but create more sustainable businesses for farmers and chefs.

Weaving together agriculture, animal welfare and health, food safety and science, economics, history, a deep sense of place, and amazing preserved foods, Salted and Cured is a literary feast, a celebration of both innovation and time-honored knowledge, and an expertly guided tour of America’s culinary treasures, both old and new.

A resident of Montpelier, Vermont, Jeff Roberts is president of Cow Creek Creative Ventures, which is dedicated to developing solutions in the areas of agriculture and food policy, conservation, the environment, and community economic development. He was cofounder and principal consultant at the Vermont Institute for Artisan Cheese at the University of Vermont. His book The Atlas of American Artisan Cheese (Chelsea Green, 2007) was the first comprehensive survey of small-scale producers. He is a member of Guilde Internationale des Fromagers. He teaches the history and culture of food at the New England Culinary Institute, is a visiting professor at the University of Gastronomic Science, provides consulting services to a wide array of small-scale food producers, and is a frequent speaker in Europe and the United States on artisan food, sustainable agriculture, and the working landscape. His new book, Salted and Cured, examines the history and culture aspects of dry-cured meat from 1630 to the present.

Here’s a bit of an interview so you can hear more from Jeff directly. And, of course, I hope you’ll come to Camp Bacon for the Main Event to hear him talk on Friday, May 31.

Ari: You have a pretty interesting background—from meteorologist to cured meat. Can you give us some background?

Jeff: Yeah, I got struck by lightning on the way to the slaughterhouse!  

A lot of this goes back to family for me. I grew up with an interest in good food. My mother’s side of the family is from Italy. So there was always this interest for me with people who had very little money and yet they managed to create really delicious food. It’s a fascinating history. They were from Molise, in central Italy. So I was always interested in good eating.

When I was in the Navy and I got off the ship, my colleagues wanted to go get drunk, but I was hunting restaurants. When I was in graduate school in Philadelphia, it was similar. I was always seeking out things to eat that I didn’t know about and I was curious. When I left graduate school it carried over into my work. I went to work for U Penn—my first job was in fundraising for Morris Arboretum. My boss there used plants as a teaching tool to get folks excited and that made a really lasting impression on me.  

Ari: What came after that?

Jeff: I got involved with School of Veterinary Medicine at Penn and became an associate dean. I had always thought about veterinary medicine as cats and dogs but over the years, of course, I realized it was also about farm animals. This was at a time in the late 80s when PETA was very active in pushing various kinds of growers who were doing some really abusive things to stop. I remember reading some stuff about why appropriate practices meant you not only treated an animal humanely but the quality of an animal’s meat, or eggs, etc. were the best. That when you treated an animal better, the quality of the food produced improved dramatically. At that time, some of my colleagues worked with industrial agriculture, doing some of the first BST (bovine growth hormone) research to increase milk yields. It was always interesting to hear how different what they did professionally was from what they themselves wanted to eat!

I went all over the country and had a chance to meet people who did great work with animals, including a visit to the MSU vet college in Lansing. I think knew people at every vet school in the country, many of whom made lasting impressions.

When I left Penn 25 years ago, I went to work for the Vermont Land Trust. And I started to use food as a teaching tool. I met people who were doing amazing things with food! I was one of the founders of the Vermont Fresh Network, and Shelburne Farms hired me to do adult education food programs. After leaving the Land Trust, I heard about Slow Food. So I sent a note to Slow Food, and Patrick Martins (one of the founders of Slow Food America and the man behind Heritage Foods) responded. And in 1999, when Carlo Petrini came to the U.S., Vermont was the first place they went! I was asked to co-chair the 2001 U.S. presence at Slow Cheese. I wanted to do some writing after I left the Land Trust. I realized that the stories of the cheesemakers were fascinating and I wanted to tell their stories! And that’s what started me on the work to do the Cheese Atlas. In 2006 I began teaching at the New England Culinary Institute. And this lead to Carlo Petrini inviting me to teach at Slow Food University of Gastronomic Science.   

None of it’s ever really been planned.  I guess I can smell an opportunity (or bacon!) and I just follow my nose! I never believed I’d end up in Vermont or that I was going to do all this in Italy.  

Ari: What sort of history did you study?

Jeff: In grad school at Temple University I studied urban history and geography. But when I was in grad school, historians were a dime a dozen. Since a lot of my dissertation research was on the history of Philadelphia’s downtown, I went to work for a museum devoted to the city’s history. A lot of what I had learned in the Navy helped me to map Philadelphia’s downtown. I began volunteering with Museum Council of Philadelphia, where I met the director of the Morris Arboretum and was hired later as its first director of development. That got me to China for the first time.  

Ari: What about the new book?  It seems perfect for Camp Bacon!

Jeff: It’s all about the culture and history of cured pork in the U.S. What I discovered doing this book was all about the cultural landscape around food preservation . . . Like when Mark Kurlansky wrote about Cod.  

Ari: That’s one of my favorite food books of all time!

Jeff: I realized as I started working on what became Salted and Cured that it was really all about the culture.  You can’t understand the history of the United States without understanding the history of pork. It was what people lived on and that’s what I want to talk about. That what I really wanted to do was not to write just about ‘who was doing what,’ but how to focus more on what they represent in this shift in culture.

Among the most interesting surprises were people like Sant’Antonio Abate (St. Anthony the Abbott), an Egyptian Roman Catholic monk, who is the patron saint of butchers, domestic animals, basket-makers, and gravediggers. Sant’Antonio founded Christian monasticism and as such often treated people suffering from shingles, known as St. Anthony’s Fire (Fuoco di Sant’Antonio), with salves made from pork fat! People, impressed by portraits of Sant’Antonio, associated him with swineherds and butchers!

Or tracing Nancy Newsom Mahaffey’s six-hundred-year family history of smoking and curing hams! From ancestors in Lancashire who landed in early colonial Virginia to the Revolutionary War and then today’s Kentucky, family techniques and later recipes influence Nancy’s extraordinary handcrafted country hams. In 2009, a seventeen pound Newsom ham was enshrined at the Museo del Jamón, in Aracena Spain, crowned as one of the world’s greatest hams!

And how diverse, often liberal arts, backgrounds of many contemporary cured meats practitioners influence and shape their craft. Just how do experiences in fashion, reporting and writing, foreign service, French literature, classical music, graphic design, philosophy, furniture making, and agribusiness among others help create extraordinary foods?

Ari: Who are some of your favorite bacon makers and salami curers?

Jeff: There are dozens of them in the book! But one of them is Tony Fiasche, from Tempesta Foods.  I’m excited to eat his food at the Bacon Ball and hear him speak at the Main Event of Camp Bacon! In my opinion, his n’duja is the best in the country!

Ari: Can you give us a bit of a preview into what you’ll be presenting at Camp Bacon?

Jeff: I want the audience to appreciate that you can’t understand the history of the United States without grasping the essential role of pork. I plan to share some historical context and my enthusiasm for discoveries about the culture around pork. Everything from language, religion, food taboos, diet, all reflect what pork represents culturally. For African-Americans, significant aspects of culture and community exist because of slave diets.

And there’s more to hogs and pork than just how to prepare it. And going back even further, the whole Middle East used to eat it. Pigs grow fast, they have plenty of litters, so if you domesticate the animal you have a reliable food source. I’ve been doing a lot of research, writing, and speaking about the renaissance of fermented foods: craft beer, artisan cheese, cured meat, pickling, and various beverages… a remarkable resurgence.

Ari: How are you feeling about coming to Ann Arbor for Camp Bacon?

Jeff: I’m looking forward to it, since haven’t I’ve been to Ann Arbor. I can’t wait to meet Mei Zheng and hear her talk at Camp Bacon because Yunnan is one of the first places visited when I went to China in 1986.  The Chinese clearly were doing food preservation early, early on. Confucius, you often paid him for your lessons with preserved pork. I remember seeing lawei, similar to jerky, hanging from the rafters curing in Yunnan. And that’s what Mei Zheng writes about in her book, Travels in Dali; with a Leg of Ham. And I’m really excited to finally meet Tony Fiasche (from Tempesta).  I definitely want to go the dinner he’s cooking at the Roadhouse on Thursday (May 30).

Ari: Before I let you go, what’s your favorite way to eat bacon?

Jeff: Oh my… let me count the ways!

• Absolutely BLTs!
• Bacon and eggs
• Bacon topped baked beans
• Bacon topped burgers
• Bacon garnish on fresh green salad
• Bacon wrapped scallops
• And just plain old bacon on its own! Like Benton’s!

Damn… this is making me hungry!!

Our 8th Annual Zingerman’s Camp Bacon® was one of our best yet! Hundreds of campers came to Ann Arbor for five days of bacon-centric events last week, which kicked off with our Film Festival and sizzled to the end with a family-friendly Street Fair. In between, there was also a Bacon Beautiful music event, bacon cooking classes at BAKE!, a Detroit food tour, a special Bacon Ball dinner, and of course the Main Event.

Here are some photos of the festivities to enjoy. Sign up for our Camp Bacon enewsletter, and you’ll be the first to hear when we start planning our 9th Annual Camp Bacon!

The Main Event

They even took a torch to the skin to get it extra crispy:

A post shared by Zingerman’s Community (@zingermanscommunity) on Jun 3, 2017 at 10:06am PDT

Camp Bacon Film Fest

Camp Bacon Fresh Taste of Detroit Tour

An art break:

Chef Susan Welch presented a multi-course dinner at revolver in Hamtramck:

Bacon Beautiful Music

Camp Bacon Bacon Ball

We hope you enjoyed looking back on Camp Bacon with us. We hope you’ll join us next year! If you’d like to purchase Camp Bacon swag, shop our website. 

While bacon is definitely at the center of Camp Bacon, people from all over the country flock to our annual pork-centric event to hear from our amazing speakers! And this year, we’re presenting one of the best lineups of special guests. We have journalists, food artisans, chefs, filmmakers and more coming to share their wisdom, talents and art with us.

Don’t miss these speakers:

Simran Sethi
Award-winning journalist and educator, Simran Sethi, writes about environmental and food sustainability issues. Her book, Bread, Wine, Chocolate: The Slow Loss of Foods We Love, was named one of the top food books of 2016 by Smithsonian. Simran’s talk Good Pig/Bad Pig will explore pig farming in her home state of North Carolina, the second largest pork producer in the United States. She’s flying in all the way from Rome to be with us, and we’re so excited to welcome Simran! Meet Simran Sethi at the The Main Event, June 3 at Cornman Farms.

Reserve Your Seat for the Main Event!

Ava Lowrey
Fillmmaker Ava Lowrey has been using multimedia to connect with audiences since the age of 15. She has been featured in The New York Times, Rolling Stone, CNN, Mother Jones, and more. Ava has directed multiple short documentaries and screened at festivals across the country. A native of Alexander City, Alabama, Ava’s films often focus on her Southern roots, sharing untold stories centered in the South. Come see two of Ava’s films at the Camp Bacon Food Film Fest, May 31 at Greyline. She’ll be our special guest! Get Your Tickets to the Camp Bacon Food Film Festival

Clark Rachal
Camp Bacon welcomes Clark Rachal from Avoyelles Parish in Louisiana Cajun country, where the art of roasting pig—called Cochon de Lait—is taken to a whole new level of flavor and gastronomical technique. But it’s more than just a cooking process, Cochon de Lait has evolved as a time-honored tradition to capture the essence of community, as people come together for really great food and festivities. Our Cochon de Lait dinner at Zingerman’s Roadhouse has SOLD OUT, but you can still get a taste of this culinary tradition at the Main Event.

Steven Burger
Steven Burger is President of Burgers’ Smokehouse, a 4th generation family-owned business located in California, Missouri. Burgers’ Smokehouse is nationally recognized—most recently their Cajun Bacon Steaks were named on Extra Crispy’s Best Bacon in America list—as a leading producer of cured and smoked meat and poultry products sold at grocery stores, restaurants, and through Zingerman’s Mail Order. Steven will give us the lowdown on how Burgers’ Smokehouse got its beginnings in country ham.

That’s just a few. Check out the full, fantastic Camp Bacon speaker’s list here.

Camp Bacon, a true pork lover’s paradise and fundraiser for Southern Foodways Alliance and Washtenaw County 4-H, is almost here! And it’s going to sizzle. Some events have already sold out, but you can still grab your tickets for our Camp Bacon Food Film Fest, Main Event and Bakin’ with Bacon. We’d also have some fun FREE events lined up, too!

Here are all the details:

Camp Bacon Food Film Festival
Wednesday, May 31, 6:00pm – 9:00

The fascinating stories behind beloved Southern women food makers are captured in this collection of short documentaries. Bacon snacks, like bacon popcorn and Cuban Pork Zingers, are included with ticket. Beer, wine, bacon cocktails and non-alcoholic drinks are available for purchase.

$35/person ($10 goes to SFA) Location: Greyline, 100 N. Ashley St, Ann Arbor

Get your tickets today

Main Event
Saturday, June 3rd, 2017, 8:00am – 4:00pm

13 speakers, two meals, and so much bacon. This all-day event is packed with lots of learning, a whole lot of laughing and, of course, all the bacon you can eat! Bacon lovers from around the globe trek to the Camp Bacon^® Main Event each to meet and eat and share their love for really good cured pork in a day filled with presentations by bacon producers, food experts, and a few fun surprise guests. Award-winning journalist Simran Sethi is flying in from Rome, and Cochon 555 Minneapolis winner Brian Merkel will be raffling cuts of pork! And if you missed your chance for the Bacon Ball, don’t worry! We’ll also be tasting Cochon de Lait, a traditional Cajun country pig roast. 

Get your tickets today!

Bakin’ with Bacon

You’ll use the power of bacon to flavor three amazing baked goods: peppered bacon farm bread, bacon cheddar scones, and sweet and salty bacon pecan sandy cookies. Our first two classes have sold out, but you can still reserve a spot for Sunday, June 4.

$125/person. Location: BAKE! 3723 Plaza Dr., Ann Arbor

Register today!

The 8th Annual Bacon Ball: Cochon de Lait, A Dance with Flame
Thursday, June 1, 7:00pm – 9:30pm

The Roadhouse welcomes Clark Rachal from Avoyelles Parish in Louisiana Cajun country for a traditional pig roast that Ann Arbor has never experienced before.

$75/person. Location: Zingerman’s Roadhouse, 2501 Jackson Ave., Ann Arbor

SOLD OUT!

Bacon Beautiful Music
Thursday, June 1, Doors 7:30pm, Music 8:00pm – Midnight

FREE EVENT! Musicians, poets and more will take to the stage to make music and entertain all of our campers! Ann Arbor Distilling Company has graciously sponsored this event, and Club Above will have bartenders on hand to craft the best made-in-Ann Arbor drinks! Doors will open at 7:30 and music will be running from 8:00pm until midnight. All performers have connections to the Zingerman’s Community of Businesses, and donations will be accepted for Southern Foodways Alliance.

This event is free. Location: Club Above, 215 N Main St,, Ann Arbor

Register here

Fresh Taste of Detroit
Friday, June 2, 12:00pm – 9:30pm

Camp Bacon® hits the road with Zingerman’s Food Tours for a high-energy tasting jaunt through the markets, kitchens, and breweries of Detroit.

$295/person. Location: Zingerman’s Roadhouse, 2501 Jackson Ave., Ann Arbor

SOLD OUT!

Camp Bacon Street Fair
Sunday, June 4, 11:00am – 2:00pm

FREE EVENT! Celebrate great pork with this a three-hour, family-friendly street fair with an array of vendors selling, sampling and showcasing all things bacon.

This event is free. Location: Sunday Artisan Market in Kerrytown, 315 Detroit St, Ann Arbor. Just show up! No registration necessary.