Today is International Bacon Day. I was informed of this by my girlfriend this morning, then immediately interrogated about our household bacon levels. My response (“one strip”) was deemed unsatisfactory, so off we went to the store to get more. At the store, I bought a half pound of bacon. Upon seeing it, my girlfriend shook her head and told me that it was insufficient bacon for International Bacon Day, so off she went to buy another pound of bacon.

While at the store, I saw figs and immediately thought of wrapping them in bacon. Well, to tell the truth, I wanted to wrap everything in bacon, but I thought of a wonderful meal I had at Gitane, hosted by the same person who cooked me a meal during her visit to San Francisco. It was quite a while ago and I had a few glasses of wine, so many of the dishes fade in my memory but I remember their bacon bon bons  somewhat well. They stuff prunes with goat cheese, wrap them in bacon, and glaze them with port. I figured I would do something similar.

The process is fairly self-explanatory. Stuff figs with goat cheese, add a pecan, wrap in bacon, and secure it with a toothpick. Then, bake it at 400 degrees F for about 20 minutes or so. I finished mine in the broiler, turning them to crisp them up for about 2 minutes. Alternately, you can broil them for about 5 minutes or until the bacon is cooked.

Stuffing the figs with goat cheese and topping them with a pecan half

Now, I know what you’re thinking, “Bacon-themed meal with faded retro-esque pictures? What a hipster.”

And I concur. I should be judged.

In my defense, it was only because my camera’s battery died (it was charged by the end to take the first picture above) and my girlfriend’s phone consistently took blurry pictures with the regular camera app, so we used the “Retro Camera” app. I am a hipster by accident, if at all.

Into the oven you go!

While these did end up being decently delicious, the next time I would do the following:

• Add more sweetness: I would do this either by using riper figs or, per my girlfriend’s suggestion, drizzling honey over them. Alternately, you could also use some brown sugar to candy the bacon (what’s a few hundred more calories?)
• Remove the pecan: It didn’t add all that much. The bacon provided enough crispy, crunch texture on its own. Speaking of which, I would also
• Use thinner strips of bacon: We bought thick slices of pre-cut bacon from the butcher. Next time, I’ll ask him or her to slice me some thin strips off of the slab.
• Use whole figs: The fig flavor was overwhelmed by the goat cheese and the bacon. Using thinner strips of bacon and riper figs would likely improve the balance, but just having more fig would be helpful. Plus, it would allow me to
• Wrap the bacon around the whole fig so that the cheese is exposed to the heat and no part of the bacon is touching the bottom of the cooking dish. Not only does this allow for wonderful browning of the cheese, it also cooks the bacon more evenly and prevents you from having to rotate it. In the picture above, you can see that I rested them on racks to allow the fat to drop down. Even this didn’t allow for even cooking except in ones where the bacon was wrapped perpendicularly to the dish.

Bacon grease basted eggs, with bacon on the side