Beyond Bacon – What & Why


Want to learn how to cook the whole hog, without grains, dairy, legumes and refined-sugar? Interested in making treats with lard, enhance the flavor of vegetables and get plenty of healthful CLA and Vitamin D from pastured pork? Wondering how to help the earth with a focus on sustainable swine?

Beyond Bacon, is available in all major bookstores and Costco, U.S.!!

Beyond Bacon is Available at Costco Stores in the U.S.

Beyond Bacon, Paleo Recipes that Respect the Whole Hog

I’m sure you’ll notice, this cookbook’s a little different than our last. So, here’s the back story.

It was almost 2 years ago we started thinking about our first cookbook. The important things to us, at that time, were the drastic health improvements we’d seen in our kids. With a completely changed diet and lifestyle we wanted a fun, family-oriented cookbook our kids could use to feel empowered to make good food choices.

We’d never envisioned ourselves cookbook authors and the thrill of the opportunity was one of those life-altering moments. The paleo market wasn’t yet filled with all the wonderful resources it currently is. Our point of view was distinct for that book; we created unique and fun recipes that family members of all ages could enjoy.

Our point-and-shoot camera didn’t quite capture the food the way we’d hoped, but we remain extremely proud to have Eat Like a Dinosaur as our first book – dedicated to our 3 fun, energetic and healthy boys. The friendships we established during that creative process have had a profound impact on our lives. They changed our health, but they also changed what our priorities were.

Why this cookbook?

These days we have a passion for food quality. Our visit to Mount Vernon Farm and Polyface last year sparked a passion in Stacy for sustainable farming. Healthy fats and protein from pastured animals have greatly improved Stacy’s digestive health. But it’s not cheap – so we began buying whole animals to make it more affordable. Committed to using every part of that animal, out of respect, brought us to where we are today.

The paleo community loves bacon. But pastured pork is the most affordable per-pound meat we could find. When your chest freezer is full with whole pastured pigs regularly, you learn to cook it all. And we mean ALL. Like most great partnership marriages, we found a happy place where Stacy’s passion for pastured pork met with Matt’s talent to cook it – and now, a book baby will be born.

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Beyond Bacon pays homage to the humble hog by teaching you how to make more than a hundred recipes featuring cuts from the entire animal. While bacon might be the most popular part of the pig for those following the paleo diet, there is a plethora of other delicious and nutrient dense cuts to enjoy.

Pastured pork is rich in Omega 3 fatty acids and conjugated linoleic acid (CLA), the “good fats” our doctors want us to eat – not to mention high in Vitamin D, a deficiency for most Americans.  Beyond Bacon breaks the myths behind this often eschewed meat and shows you how create delectable dishes that are grain-, legume-, dairy-, and refined sugar-free.  Beyond Bacon allows you to improve your health and the environment by focusing on sustainable swine.

Don’t let the dried out pork of your youth scare you away! All the recipes in Beyond Bacon are elegant yet approachable, making it the ultimate cookbook for the foodie in you. You’ll find:

  • Perfect Pork Chops, better than most restaurant steaks,
  • Pho Soup with chitterling “noodles” and other healing and delicious soups and stews to stretch your dollar,
  • the already-famous-among-recipe-testers Savory Bacon Jam fantastic with green apples or our Homestyle Biscuits
  • sweet treats made luxuriously rich with lard, such as Grain-Free Pie Crust, Salted Mocha BiscottiFudge, and Maple Lard Scones,
  • instructions on how to properly BBQ and smoke your meats as well as recipes to make your own sauces,
  • instructions for curing your own bacon, pancetta and even home-made sausage better than store bought,
  • details on how to properly fry foods, like Corn Dogs with Sweet Potato Crisps and Sweet & Sour Pork, and
  • an extensive guide on how to make and cook with the nutrient dense essentials: pork stock and CLA-rich lard.

Beyond Bacon delivers mouth-watering photos for each delicious recipe.  With a rustic aesthetic and appreciation for tradition, Beyond Bacon recreates the rich and wonderful food perfected generations ago, in a healthful way.

The best part for you, other than the food, is the drool-worthy food photography.

With friends like Primal-Palate, Civilized Caveman, Nom Nom Paleo and Against All Grain – we’re able to admit our own photography (featured on our blog and in Eat Like a Dinosaur) isn’t quite up to par with the vision we had for this book. We wanted a rustic aesthetic, inspired by antique farmhouses – like some of my favorite food bloggers on my Food Photography Pinterest Board: Roost, Gourmande in the Kitchen and The Urban Poser.

That’s where our professional photographer friend Aimee of Aimee Buxton Photography came in. We took a nod from Diane of Practical Paleo on this one – if you’ve got talented friends, let them help you out! It is Aimee’s talent behind the camera that’s made Matt’s mouth-gasm worthy recipes into food porn on the page. We’re hoping with our powers combined, you’ll get the total package of a top-notch cookbook – paleo or not.

Beyond Bacon by the Paleo Parents

Now, let’s get this straight. We’re still Matt & Stacy. Our site got a little facelift, but we will continue to be The Paleo Parents. Our kids have eaten and loved every recipe in Beyond Bacon. In fact, quite a few of the recipes have been featured on this blog already. We just packaged them a little differently for book #2. If you click the photos below, you’ll be taken to the originally posted recipe that we transformed for Beyond Bacon. (Hint Hint: If you want a sneak peak at Beyond Bacon Recipes, we’ve tagged them on our site…)

Beyond Bacon was released July 2, 2013 in all major bookstores – and as of Tuesday, March 3, 2015, is also now available in Costco stores throughout the U.S.

 

Last but not least, we’re super excited that, like most top rated cookbooks, Beyond Bacon was released as a hardback. That means it’ll stay in place better on your recipe stand and be tougher for all that use in the kitchen. It will also, hopefully, be a stunning piece of art you can share with friends and family. Because, any diet that encourages the eating of fatty hog meats will probably be a welcome proposition for them!

To summarize:

  • Beyond Bacon was released as a hardback July 2, 2013 and feature paleo (grain-, legume-, dairy-, refined sugar-free) recipes from the whole hog –  it will teach you how to understand ordering a whole animal, our suggestions for finding a farmer, a breed of animal, the cuts you’ll need to order and how to cook any parts (including offal, bones and fat) that the deliciousness of a pastured pig provides.
  • Aimee Buxton, our photographer, is offering serious foodies an opportunity to enjoy the food as much visually as you will when you taste the recipes.
  • This will be THE recipe book you NEED EVERY summer. Honestly, if you don’t get an opportunity to eat the smoked pork belly, make your own sausage, and make The Best Brownies topped with Frozen Custard and Salted Caramel Sauce your life may, in fact, be incomplete.
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