Homemade Bacon:

Sounds delicious. No smoking — and no added water, a deletion that the author (my friend Kristina Johnson, who is a former chef) reports is quite valuable — but garlic, pepper, cumin, thyme, juniper, anise, and bay leaves, plus the usual salt, sugar, and of course Homer Simpson's and Pliny the Elder's favorite meat. It's the sort of thing I would have gladly tried before the arrival of my energetic sons caused me to put most of my cooking interests on the back burner. Yum.