Certain flavors just go together. 
Maple syrup, bacon, dates and blue cheese are one of those combinations that just works. I’ve posted a few things with bacon in the last few weeks and I have one more for you. Next week, I will try to give it a rest for the sake of my cholesterol (and yours) but in the meanwhile let’s all enjoy it!
This recipe got its start when I was looking at the pan of bacon grease that was left behind from the Bacon and Blue Cheese Stuffed Dates from a couple of weeks ago. 
Really, it is such a shame to throw away perfectly good bacon grease. So I thought wouldn’t it be delicious to toast baguette pieces in the bacon grease and then put a small heap of goodness on top?
The “goodness on top” took on a life of its own once I got things simmering on the stove. This concoction of maple syrup, brown sugar, dates and bacon is utterly divine. I may work on a version of this for a brownie sundae topping but that will be a whole other post….
And doesn’t blue cheese just make everything taste better? You don’t need much on top of these – just a little bit to give it a zing 🙂 Once you assemble these, give them a quick hit in the toaster or oven just to make the cheese a little bit melty.
Enjoy!
Ingredients
- 4 slices of bacon, cooked, cooled and broken into small pieces.
- Bacon grease from 4 slices of bacon, separated
- 1/3 cup chopped dates
- 1 Tablespoon brown sugar
- 1/4 cup maple syrup
- Baguette (cut into a dozen round pieces)
Instructions
- Cook bacon according to package directions.
- While bacon is cooking, slice baguette into round pieces
- When bacon is done cooking, leave the grease in the frying pan so you have it to dunk the bread in.
- Once the grease has cooled a bit, dunk only one side of each of the baguette slices in the bacon grease, and place dunked side down on a nonstick frying pan.
- Turn stove heat up to medium-high and let them brown for a couple of minutes. When dunked side has a moderately toasted coating from the cooking, turn the burner off and remove pan from heat.
- Take toasted baguettes off of baking sheet and place on a metal rack to cool
- In a small frying pan or sauce pan oven medium heat , combine 1/4 cup bacon crumbles, 1/2 cup chopped dates, 1/4 cup maple syrup and 1 tablespoon of brown sugar.
- Stir every 30-60 seconds to ensure mixture is combined and not sticking to pan. After 4-5 minutes, it should be syrupy and very sticky!
- Spoon one teaspoon of mixture onto the toast, and top with a small amount of blue cheese (dime or nickel sized).
- Place in toaster on "toast" or oven preheated to 400 degrees for 5-10 minutes. They are done once the appetizers have become fragrant in the oven, and cheese on top is melty.
- Serve em hot!
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