Bacon Dishes We'll Miss from Five Metro Phoenix Restaurants That Do Bacon Right (Assuming the Bacon-Apocalypse Really is Coming, God Forbid)

Nikki Buchanan

Pork belly appetizer at Davanti Enoteca

Got a freezer? Like, a big one? If so, you might want to stock up on bacon and other pig products pronto before the world-wide shortage on all things porcine hits your wallet.

See also:
- Global Bacon Shortage
- S'Mores Smackdown: Frank & Albert's vs. Beckett's Table

Bad enough that it'll cost an arm and a leg just to set a couple of strips of cured and salted pork belly next to your morning eggs. But what happens when our favorite restaurant dishes, accented with crispy bacon-y goodness, start costing a small fortune?

Here are a few of the bacon-centric specialties I don't ever want to live without:

Buchanan

Tempura bacon with foie gras, brioche toast, poached egg and bernaise at Crush Lounge

Christopher's Restaurant/Crush Lounge
2502 E. Camelback Road, Biltmore Fashion Park, Phoenix, 602-522-2344, www.christophersaz.com

At the moment, there's no shortage of bacon at Christopher's. But that's not surprising, given that this is a modern French restaurant and the French unabashedly love bacon (or lardons, the term used when it's diced, blanched and fried). At Christopher's you'll find lardons in a classic frisee salad with poached egg, as well as in an Alsatian tart. But the expression of bacon you won't want to miss -- the dish that should be served with a defibrillator -- is offered at Crush Lounge (the moody adjacent bar) and it is as deliciously bad for you as anything Elvis ever dreamed up in his drug-demented little head. Get this: silky foie gras au torchon (think meat-butter) with poached egg, brioche toast, a few sunny dollops of Bearnaise and deep-fried tempura bacon ($14). You might live longer on the Paleo diet but then what's the point of living without bacon? And foie? And bearnaise?

Zinc Bistro
15034 N. Scottsdale Road, Scottsdale, 480-603-0922, www.zincbistroaz.com

Chef Matt Carter clearly loves bacon and its first cousin pork belly (which is simply unsalted and uncured bacon cut a bit thicker). Both are found all over the menus at both Zinc and The House, which recently opened in Old Town. But the dish that makes a breathtaking poem of pork is currently on the menu at Zinc, and it goes something like this: bacon-wrapped pork tenderloin with sauce hydro-miel (think caramelized mirepoix, foamed honey, demi, butter and macerated prunes), sided with popcorn cabbage, which contains lardons and rich elephant garlic crema, made with condensed milk). The dish costs $32, and I don't care if it costs $100. I want it. Often.