Major Tom
Thinks s/he gets paid by the post
This thread really ties in with the long-standing preoccupation many of our forum members have with bacon doesn't it?
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!JOHNNIE36 said:....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?
Absolutely.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 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.
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.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.
And there is chicharron. Deep fried pork skin. When they use lard there is nothing tastier. Mexican food is so good.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
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.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.
I can't believe I am the only person that took bacon fat and sugar sandwichs to school for lunch.
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.
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?
The best pie crust is made with lard not vegetable shortening, so the great pie crust people have told me.
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!
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
+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.