The recipe
Ingredients
Directions
Render the fat
Cut the leaf fat into small pieces and place it in a clean iron kettle.
Heat over a steady, moderate fire until only scraps of meat remain.
Keep the heat gentle to avoid burning the lard.
Strain and store
Spread a coarse cloth in a wire sieve and strain the liquid into tin basins that hold 2 to 3 quarts.
Squeeze out all the fat from the scraps.
Once the lard is cold, press a piece of muslin onto it and trim off the excess.
Store in a cool place or in wooden kegs with tight covers.
Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.
Explore the science
What each ingredient does
- Leaf fat from a bacon hog
- Provides the fat that melts down to become the lard itself.
- Beef suet (optional)
- Adds more firm animal fat to the rendered lard, if used.
The step that matters
Keep the heat gentle. Fat rendered over too high a fire scorches the solids and the lard, giving it a burnt, bitter flavor and a shorter shelf life. Slow, moderate heat melts the fat out cleanly while the scraps stay pale.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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