No such thing as too much bacon.

Baconfest Dinner at Chalkboard Restaurant

Remember when I went to Baconfest Chicago and ate all the bacon? Remember how awesome it was? The bad news is that Baconfest comes but once a year…the good news is that they are starting bacon satellite dinners so we all can get our bacon fix in the mean time…

Yesterday I met up with Meredith after work and Joe came and picked us up. After virtually no traffic we made it to North Center with about an hour to spare. After checking to see if the restaurant had a bar we headed a few doors down to have a couple of beers beforehand. Well, Joe had two, Meredith had one, and I had about a half…but I didn’t gag or anything so we’ll call that a success.

After wasting some time we headed a couple doors back to Chalkboard Restaurant for a night of bacon goodness.

The night started out with a glass of Prosecco, some pickled bacon lollipops, some bacon hush puppies, some White bean and bacon crostini…

After some serious bacon noshing we sat down for the rest of the meal to begin…

A first course of roasted scallops and bacon with preserved watermelon, olives, and vanilla mayonnaise…I’m not so sure how I felt about vanilla mayo, but it worked when everything was combined together.

Then a second course of “Malt and Salt” braised pork belly with celery root puree…with a rather meaty and not just fatty piece of pork belly.

And finally a Templeton Rye bacon bread pudding with ice cream and a bacon-maple frosting. The chef said he made the frosting with all the leftover bacon renderings. The bread pudding was a little heavy but I could have eaten the ice cream/frosting combo all day.

Afterwards I decided to forgo a ride and walk the mile and a half home to walk off a little of the bacon fat. It was a good plan.

Since there is really no such thing as too much bacon I’m already planning ahead to thinking of going to one of the next ones…which is at the Southern…which is the bar where Mat works at…which is awesome.