Feb 17, 2010; Bacon Torch

[xoxoxoBruce]

Ever get heartburn from bacon? Lucky it wasn't from this bacon.

I recently committed myself to the goal, before the weekend was out, of creating a device entirely from bacon and using it to cut a steel pan in half. My initial attempts were failures, but I knew success was within reach when I was able to ignite and melt the pan using seven beef sticks and a cucumber.

I used prosciutto (Italian for "expensive bacon") because it is a superior engineering grade of meat. I wrapped slices of it into thin tubes and baked them overnight in a warm oven to drive off all the water. Then I bundled seven of those together, wrapped them in additional slices, and baked the bundle again until it was hard and dry.
To make an airtight, less-flammable outer casing, I wrapped this fuel core with uncooked prosciutto before attaching one end of it to an oxygen hose.

OK, but what about the cucumber?

It turns out there are much easier ways to do this. For example, while researching how to build a vegetarian lance, I hit on the perfect pipe material -- hollowed-out cucumbers. The pressure-containment capacity of a standard cucumber is remarkable, and the smooth skin makes it easy to create an airtight seal with the pipe delivering oxygen to the device. A cucumber packed with beef sticks will burn for almost two minutes, and a completely vegetarian version stuffed with breadsticks, though not quite as long-lasting, still produces a very impressive flame.

Vegetarian thermal lance? Oh sure, how about a kosher A-bomb too.


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