Harry Trotter

Welcome to the wild world of Pig Racing! Apparently the idea was born in the U.S., but the sport is picking up in England and New Zealand. Originally, the race was held on a 100m flat track, but now they have added jumps for additional excitement. 

I love the names. Harry Trotter and Pigtoria Beckham are my faves. 

David

Finally! Lard is cool...

The Lipid Hypothesis was developed in the late 1800's and gained wide popularity starting around the 1950's. It has led Americans to fear dietary fats. In the 1990's, the notion of so-called "good fats" took hold and increased the popularity of olive and canola oils.

I have Jennifer McLagan's new book Fat: An Appreciation of a Misunderstood Ingredient in my reading stack. I am very much looking forward to reading it. I was pleased to see that it was mentioned in this article proclaiming that lard is finally cool again. It appears that lard fits into the current interests in minimally processed foods and environmental consciousness. Those of us who really cook know that some fat in your diet is good and have never been scared of lard. Whatever floats your boat, I just know its good stuff.

David

Hey, will you watch my pig for me?

Thanks to Gioia for sending this article discussing the concept of "remote pig ownership". It also has a comparison of Italian and Brittish butchering styles. You can read for yourself, but let's just say that the Italian put the Brittish butcher to shame.

 

I am also very interested in "Pestadice", a sausage with little nuggets of fried, crunchy pork skin mixed into it. I'll have to do some research on this one.

 

David

So how did I get into sausagemaking?

I'll admit, it is an odd hobby. I have been making sausage for about 7 years. Several years ago I started collecting old cookbooks. I liked old cookbooks because they do not use shortcuts (a can of this, a packet of that...). I found that some of these cookbooks contained recipes for regional sausages that are no longer made. I bought a Kitchen-Aid Meat Grinder and Stuffer Attachement to give some of these recipes a try. My first attempts yielded mixed results. I had some successes and some failures. However, after several batches, I started to get the hang of it. The Kitchen-Aid quickly became a limiting factor.

Everything changed when I got a small commercial sausage stuffer for my birthday. It became a full blown hobby when I added a stand-alone meat grinder and vaccuum sealer. I make over a dozen fresh sausages now, mostly adapted from old recipes. I favor Cajun/Creole, Mediterranean, and Western European styles.

Recently, I have tried my hand a meat curing. I have made pancetta, bresaola, and lonzino with good results. I am planning to try my hand at fermented salamis before the end of the summer.

David

Welcome

I have started this blog to catalog my numerous projects and experiments. They usually involve pork in some way or another. All are welcome here, but if you are a vegitarian, this may not be the blog for you. 

Enjoy,

David