Is the bacon-flavor craze over?

With a bacon-flavored soda on the way, the food cognoscenti wonder if Americans have finally exhausted all reasonable uses for pork bellies

Among its plethora of pork-flavored products, the Jones Bacon Soda Holiday pack includes "Bacon Lip Balm."
(Image credit: myJones.com)

The news that Jones Soda Co. would be introducing a bacon-flavored carbonated beverage has prompted more than a few disgusted reactions. It also coincides with renewed speculation that American food culture's love affair with bacon, which seemed to hit fever pitch a couple of years ago, is finally dead. This is not the first time foodies have predicted bacon's demise; it was declared "over" in 2008 and 2009. But with bacon-inspired products becoming increasingly weird — baconnaise comes to mind — is this trend finally dying? (Watch a "bacon soda" taste test)

Enough already: "Bacon had a good run," says Katy Mclaughlin at The Wall Street Journal, but "now it has gone flabby—used too much and too often, it's lost its novelty and coated fine dining with a ubiquitous veneer of porky grease." These days, it's "in every restaurant," "in every course," and "in every dish," and that's simply too much. The "bacon bubble" needs to pop.

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