Posts Tagged ‘Appleton Farms’
Appleton Farms Ham Review
I’ve written about Appleton Farms products before; it’s the in-house brand that Aldi has. This is about their “Butt Portion Bone In Ham Water Added.” To me, it’s significant that “water added” is part of the main product description, and in the ingredients you’ll find a host of “salts.” Salt + water = brine = increased product weight = deterioration of meat muscle and texture.
At least to me. Anytime I run into a brine injected muscle meat, the texture puts me off. I’m sure it’s fine for the masses, tender, soft, but to me, it’s lost all connection to the animal flesh it started out as.
This ham is smoked and otherwise, the flavor is good. I was able to “save it” a pleasurable experience for me by pan frying slices of the ham, removing most of the water. Aldi contracts with Gusto Packing, outside of Chicago, to produce this ham. Gusto also makes boneless hams and bacon on a contract basis. The Gusto plant is pictured below.
Gusto was purchased by Butterball a couple years back. When searching for info on the company, I saw this story about one of Gusto’s executives getting kidnapped a few years back. For ransom. You don’t see that much anymore.
Appleton Farms Ham Review
Appleton Farms Fully Cooked Bacon Review
Appleton Farms is one of the in-house brands for the Aldi grocery chain. I’ve written a lot of posts about Aldi products, which I generally find to be of good quality and terrific value. Their fully cooked bacon is no exception, a package of which sells generally for less than two bucks. I’ve become a convert to pre-cooked, you can usually find one brand or another on sale for less than the raw product, plus you know exactly what you are getting, meaning, you don’t open a package and find pieces that are mostly fat, mostly broken and the like. There is some really crappy bacon out there.
This was flavorful and the slices come staggered on wax paper, so they are easy to remove. You can serve nice intact whole slices, or chop/cut as desired.
The contract manufacturer that Aldi uses for this product, is Shelby County Cookers, out of Harlan, IA, about 70 miles west of Des Moines and 10 miles north of I-80.
Shelby because a subsidiary of Monogram Foods a couple years ago. Monogram has its own brands and makes some licensed product, too. They are big in the meat snack business.
Picture of the Shelby plant below. Yes, I’d buy this again.
Appleton Farms Fully Cooked Bacon Review
