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AA sniffs out Blighty's best bacon sarnie

West Midlands cafe honoured

The AA has judged that Bob's Big Bite in Stourbridge is where weary travellers can refuel with Blighty's best bacon sarnie - a combination "solid back bacon" between "robust" hand-sliced bread presented on "a real plate with a paper napkin", as the Telegraph puts it.

The agreeable task of choosing the winner fell to the AA's patrolman of the year, Andy Taylor, who spent a month on the road visiting 50 finalists nominated by the association's mobile units. Having gained half a stone in the process, he finally awarded Big Bite the bacon crown, while Mega Bites cafe in Portsmouth was judged to offer the best cup of tea - described as Taylor as a "proper cuppa".

In case you're wondering, the "best lavatories" are to be found in Mickey's Diner in Aylesford, Kent, for which it will pick up, in common with the other laureates, a set of plates or mugs.

Bob's Big Bite's Bob Hunt enthused: "We are so thrilled to have won this award. We work hard to give our customers the best quality food and service and look forward to showing off our plates with them."

We suspect Hunt is aware of Leeds Uni's vital research into bacon sandwiches, which in 2007 revealed the following recipe for sarnie success: Take two or three back bacon rashers, cook under a preheated grill for seven minutes at around 240°C and nestle between two slices of farmhouse bread around 1-2cm thick.

The Leeds experts, who toiled for 1,000 hours on 700 bacon sarnie variations, were finally able to offer this formula for hot sliced pork action: N = C + {fb (cm) . fb (tc)} + fb (Ts) + fc . ta, where N=force in Newtons required to break the cooked bacon, fb=function of the bacon type, fc=function of the condiment/filling effect, Ts=serving temperature, tc=cooking time, ta=time or duration of application of condiment/filling, cm=cooking method, C=Newtons required to break uncooked bacon. ®

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