Morningstar Farms Veggie Breakfast Bacon Strips

Submitted by Steve DiPietro

"Enjoy the authentic smoky flavor and satisfying crisp of bacon with your favorite breakfast or in a BLT," instructs the printing on the box. Seems pretty straightfoward. But you need to read between the lines here. What the box is really telling you is to never, under any circumstances, eat this product alone. Always have it with real food, so that you don't discover the affront to nature that is the Veggie Bacon Strip.

Prompted by a vegetarian co-worker, I took a bite of what looked like a child's rendering of bacon. After catching the pieces that it broke into when I bit down, I foolishly threw them into my mouth. Now, I'll give the mad scientists at Morningstar Farms a little credit: it tasted vaguely like bacon. It tasted like what an android that is trying to fit in with us humans would imagine bacon would taste like. When hidden inside a BLT, it might even work. Eaten alone in a dark editing bay, it did not work. Was my co-worker actually an android? How many more of them were there? Is this how their infiltration would be exposed? By me, here in this room, eating what feels like petrified carpet cushioning with a hint of bacon flavor? Did his eyeball just take a picture of me? It did. Why did I trust a vegetarian?

Morningstar Farms also makes a Veggie Breakfast Sausage, both in link form and as a patty.

mood: amused