Lard

[Major Tom]

This thread really ties in with the long-standing preoccupation many of our forum members have with bacon doesn't it?

 

[Major Tom]

You guys have me jones-ing for some drippings on toast right now, darn it.

 

[Goonie]

....I remember having breakfast with Dad in the mornings, this was in the 40's, and Mom always fixed him fried eggs in bacon grease....

Mom also made a tossed salad and the dressing was fried up little pieces of bacon and the drippings. She called it wilted lettuce. Anyone ever hear of this type salad?

Mom and I both HAVE to fry up a mess of bacon first, so we have the bacon grease to fry the eggs in!!! We just can't stand eggs fried any other way!

As for the bacon drippings over salads, we like it over fresh spinach instead of lettuce. There are a couple of 'up-scale' restaurants around here that serve the wilted spinach salads that way. They think it's something new! Haha!

 

[bbbamI]

Mom also made a tossed salad and the dressing was fried up little pieces of bacon and the drippings. She called it wilted lettuce. Anyone ever hear of this type salad?

Absolutely.

My momma would make that with all different types of greens.

 

[ERD50]

Mom also made a tossed salad and the dressing was fried up little pieces of bacon and the drippings. She called it wilted lettuce. Anyone ever hear of this type salad?

...

As for the bacon drippings over salads, we like it over fresh spinach instead of lettuce. There are a couple of 'up-scale' restaurants around here that serve the wilted spinach salads that way. They think it's something new! Haha!

Absolutely.

My momma would make that with all different types of greens.

DW started making that some years ago. Spinach, the bacon, hard boiled eggs, and some almonds or walnuts or pecans - probably a few other bits in there I don't recall. Delicious and very 'upscale' with the right things in it. IIRC, there was some vinegar in there, which gave a nice bite with the bacon. Hmmmmm!

Some of the great family/friends cooks I knew (that are gone now) would insist upon lard for some things. I think I read recently that there are all different grades of lard, and getting the right kind for the cooking you are doing is tough (if you can find it at all).

audreyh1's post has inspired me, I'll check out the local Mexican mercados around me - lots of interesting stuff there (I love dried hibiscus - makes great tea, soda, vinaigrette and even a sauce for pork).

Some recipes for the Hibiscus:

http://patismexicantable.com/cgi-bi...arch=hibiscus&IncludeBlogs=3&limit=20&x=0&y=0



-ERD50

 

[Nodak]

My grandmother would collect the pan drippings and usually in the fall of the year make lye soap for doing laundry.

 

[nun]

I grew up in the Uk in the 1960s and lard was the cooking fat of choice....we'd never heard of olive oil. We had a "chip pan" for frying and you'd put it on the heat and wait for the white lard to melt.

Lard was also used in all pie crusts. I use lard quite often as it's easily available in the supermarket. The harder thing to find is beef suet, but if I ask the butcher at Wholefoods I can usually get some to make suet pastry or really tasty dumplings.

 

[veremchuka]

The best pie crust is made with lard not vegetable shortening, so the great pie crust people have told me.

 

[audreyh1]

I was watching the local farm show on public TV this evening. They said Southeast USA farmers are exporting lots of pork to Mexico (over a billion $ worth this year) and the average Mexican eats 5 times as much pork as the average American.

However, I think I'm above average.

I'm not surprised! But when I visit my dad in GA, I notice that in the southeast people are pretty crazy about pork too! Gee, you never saw so many forms of ham or salt pork. I guess their greens wouldn't be right without it.

And then there's their BBQ. Folks from GA and NC think Texans are crazy for using beef in their BBQ. It's sacrilegious! They consider pork the anointed one.....

 

[MichaelB]

We have LOTS OF LARD in The Valley. Mexicans/Latinos are crazy about pork in all its forms. I've gotten used to the flavor of lard in pinto beans, so I go down to the local Mexican grocery to get me some of that fresh rendered roasted lard for my beans. They dont taste right without it. None of that purified white stuff - you've got to have that roasted pork flavor. The groceries sell little pig skin squares for beans, pig cracklings in every form. I keep discovering new pork products LOL!

At our favorite carnitas place (carnitas are Mexican-style chunks of roasted pork shoulder) they put some caramelized roasted pig fat from right under the skin called cueritos on the platter too. It's kind of soft and gelatinous. We've developed a liking for it!

I guess the Spaniards were (are) just as crazy about their pork. We had some mighty fine Jamon Serrano and some lovely Spanish cured chorizo over the holidays.

Crisco - the partially hydrogenated vegetable fat kind - is full of trans-fats and thus much less heart healthy than the original lard it replaced. I suppose they've reformulated it by now? I only use butter in my baking, but lard would probably be healthier than butter for pie crusts.

Audrey

And there is chicharron. Deep fried pork skin. When they use lard there is nothing tastier. Mexican food is so good.

My favorite sweet, from childhood, is cherry pie. For many years now, however, I haven't eaten any because it just doesn't taste the same. The difference, of course, is my mother used lard to make the dough, and that gave it a deliciously flakey quality that is, for me, mandatory.

 

[audreyh1]

Yes, Michael, my reference to "pig cracklings in every form" was an attempt to include chicharrones. I have never seen such massive quantities of chicharrones as you see here in The Valley. And on a breakfast menu you'll see dishes like "Chicharrones en Salsa Verde". I haven't tried that one yet. Sometimes I find them floating in my bowl of pinto beans served at a restaurant. Bowls of pinto beans "frijoles charros" are ubiquitous here in The Valley, served as a starter or side to most meals. And they always have interesting bits of pork in them.

 

[MichaelB]

Yes, Michael, my reference to "pig cracklings in every form" was an attempt to include chicharrones. I have never seen such massive quantities of chicharrones as you see here in The Valley. And on a breakfast menu you'll see dishes like "Chicharrones en Salsa Verde". I haven't tried that one yet. Sometimes I find them floating in my bowl of pinto beans served at a restaurant. Bowls of pinto beans "frijoles charros" are ubiquitous here in The Valley, served as a starter or side to most meals. And they always have interesting bits of pork in them.

Pig cracklings. Not familiar with the term, but it appears I should be. Salsa verde wouldn't be my first choice, as we have always eaten them crispy, but I'm sure I'd get to it - when you like all the ingredients separately, you gotta try them together.

You mentioned spanish food in your previous post. My favorite sausages are chistorras, which have little kick from paprika, and morcillas - blood sausage. I could live in Mexico or Spain with no problem...

 

[East Texas]

We always have lard on hand - can't make good flour tortillas without it. And we do like our flour tortillas.

 

[haha]

I never thought I would see a thread on lard on this board, but it just goes to show. Here's a funny tidbit about someone's interactions with Armour, a major commercial lard producer. How Much is Inside Success story: Lard

In places where people have way more money than sense it has become trendy to buy "artisanal lard" at $15+/#, from a couple of holdover hippies at modern farmer's markets in expensive neighborhoods.

Was I ever surprised when a few years ago I visited my first urban Farmers' Market. When I was a boy I sometimes tended my grandparent's farm roadside stand. Tomatoes, "15 cents/#, 2 # for 25 cents." This was both better and cheaper than in the grocery store. That is not the way with today's farmers' market. Perhaps better, perhaps not, but a long way from cheaper. But of course it is 'artisanal".

Sir, I would like a dozen eggs and a large dose of fantasy, please.

Ha

 

[Major Tom]

Inspired by this thread, I started what has turned into a long thread on my Facebook account about drippings on toast. It's been wonderful to see friends and relatives contribute their memories of the use of beef and pork dripping, including a beautifully written description (by my sis-in-law) of the way that beef drippings were served on toast with salt and pepper to the kids when they returned home from school. It's just one of the memories she has of growing up in Birmingham in the 50's and 60's.

I need to stop now before I start getting hungry again.

 

[Dreamer]

I made my Baked Beans recipe within the last 2 weeks and I fry up a pound of bacon and put in them. I saved out 4 pieces and fried them the next morning and then fried our eggs in the bacon grease. It tasted so good. We only have bacon 4-5 times per year and I really like it. I really enjoy it when we do have it though.

 

[mickeyd]

I can't believe I am the only person that took bacon fat and sugar sandwichs to school for lunch.

We only had those on special days.

 

[Alan]

I grew up in the Uk in the 1960s and lard was the cooking fat of choice....we'd never heard of olive oil. We had a "chip pan" for frying and you'd put it on the heat and wait for the white lard to melt.

Lard was also used in all pie crusts. I use lard quite often as it's easily available in the supermarket. The harder thing to find is beef suet, but if I ask the butcher at Wholefoods I can usually get some to make suet pastry or really tasty dumplings.

+1

Except that we did also use olive oil. Mother kept a small bottle of it in the medicine tin. It came with a small dropper and was used for treating ear ache. She'd put the bottle in a small pan of water and warm it up, then put some drops into the ear.

 

[Ronstar]

DW's uncle told us that his parents used to store pork chops in a vat of lard, and that the kids would sneak gobs of lard from the vat and eat it by itself. My grandmother was also a big lard to Cisco convert.

I used to eat at the Heart Attack Grill in Chandler, Az - they would fry their fries in lard. It's a shame that they closed.

 

[Moemg]

Mom also made a tossed salad and the dressing was fried up little pieces of bacon and the drippings. She called it wilted lettuce. Anyone ever hear of this type salad?

Yes, We used to have it in Pennsylvania in the 50's . I loved that dressing !

 

[RAE]

Grandma and mom were right on this one - lard is good for you.

Cooking with Edible Animal Fats | Mark's Daily Apple

 

[braumeister]

The best pie crust is made with lard not vegetable shortening, so the great pie crust people have told me.

Absolutely true, according to DW who makes the best pie crust for three states around.

It's also absolutely essential for making that fantastic Belgian dish called Carbonnade Flamande. I tried it once with Crisco, just as an experiment, and was appalled. Back to good old lard the next time.

 

[Khan]

My grandma had a gallon tin bucket of rendered lard in her kitchen until the day she died in the late 1960's. She also had a tin can on the stove for bacon grease. If she made something fried, it was definitely fried in either lard or bacon grease!!!

Also, my Mom always had a pan of bacon grease sitting on the stove, ready and waiting to be used for nearly every meal. She always had a can of lard handy too. Eventually she switched over to Crisco shortening to replace the lard sometime in the mid-70's. However, she has never given up on bacon grease!

Both grandma and Mom swore that you couldn't possibly make decent pie crust without real lard, and that 'shortening' just couldn't match it!

They were right.

 

[Khan]

I never thought I would see a thread on lard on this board, but it just goes to show. Here's a funny tidbit about someone's interactions with Armour, a major commercial lard producer. How Much is Inside Success story: Lard

In places where people have way more money than sense it has become trendy to buy "artisanal lard" at $15+/#, from a couple of holdover hippies at modern farmer's markets in expensive neighborhoods.

Was I ever surprised when a few years ago I visited my first urban Farmers' Market. When I was a boy I sometimes tended my grandparent's farm roadside stand. Tomatoes, "15 cents/#, 2 # for 25 cents." This was both better and cheaper than in the grocery store. That is not the way with today's farmers' market. Perhaps better, perhaps not, but a long way from cheaper. But of course it is 'artisanal".

Sir, I would like a dozen eggs and a large dose of fantasy, please.

Ha

Several years ago I bought a hog (freezer ready) and part of the deal was several buckets of lard. Can't beat it for sauteing or deep frying.

 

[Nova]

+1

Except that we did also use olive oil. Mother kept a small bottle of it in the medicine tin. It came with a small dropper and was used for treating ear ache. She'd put the bottle in a small pan of water and warm it up, then put some drops into the ear.

That was my first introduction to olive oil, too. Dr. called it sweet olive oil.

Good pie crust is wonderful and there's not much worse than bad pie crust. I'm the world's worst pie crust maker. This thread has inspired me to buy some lard and give it another try.