Lard--Good for You and Your Family!

Used to be, pretty much everyone used lard for their baking needs. Many families lived in rural areas, and keeping a hog or two wasn't out of the question. Besides the hams, bacon, roasts, and chops, farm women rendered their lard supply from the pork fat at butchering time.

When I was raising my sons in the country, we kept hogs. Our first foray into raising our own pork was less than stellar because we fed them store bought feed with the end result that the meat was too lean and dry. But then we got a new neighbor--a retired man from Oklahoma who, as a kid, helped his family to raise hogs. He taught us how to feed our hogs mash, and our next batch of pork was fabulous! The meat was marbled and very tasty, and the color was richer. At butchering time, I decided to render the lard so I'd have a supply to use in the kitchen and for making soap.

Now a bit of pork fat facts: You don't want to use fat from the entire animal. The very best fat (that renders down to white and odorless) comes from around the kidneys and is called leaf lard. The next best area to harvest pork fat is along the back and shoulders of the animal. This is known as back fat or fatback. Leaf lard is what you hope to have for pie crusts and other pastries, biscuits, and doughnuts. Fatback can be used for baking as well, but it really shines when used for frying and sautéing. You could use the belly fat, but why would you want to? The belly (along with the marbled fat) is what gets made into bacon, which to my way of thinking, is a much better use.

If you want to render your own lard, it's not difficult, but you will probably get better at "reading" the rendering once you've done it a few times. Here's what you do:

Using a heavy pot (stainless or well seasoned cast iron), first place about 1/4 cup of water into the bottom of the pot. (This isn't absolutely necessary, but it will help the fat to not burn on the bottom of the pot before it begins melting.) Next, add cut up or ground pork fat. Turn your heat to fairly low and, stirring regularly, melt the fat. Once the fat begins to melt, bits and pieces of "stuff" will start to show. These are called cracklings. Don't overcook the fat. If you are using water, the hot fat will tend to spit and sputter so be careful not to get burned. But the water will gradually evaporate. Once the fat is melted, pour the liquid through a fine sieve that you've lined with a coffee filter or several layers of cheesecloth so as to catch the bits of cracklings. Put the melted lard into sterilized jars (wide-mouth canning jars work great), cover, and let them sit on your counter until they've congealed. When the lard is liquid, it will be light yellow in color, but will harden white. Store your lard in the fridge or freezer so it will last longer before going bad, although it will be fine in your pantry for probably several weeks (at least) if you don't have fridge space.

By the way, you can toast the cracklings in the oven, sprinkle on a wee bit of salt, and use them to top casseroles or add to salads or vegetables. Laura Ingalls Wilder wrote about loving to eat the cracklings when Ma and Pa rendered lard and for good reason . They are tasty!

But I no longer raise hogs and I don't have a line on a local hog farmer willing to give up his/her fat, so I bought lard this week:

 

 

 

I'll grant you that store-bought hydrogenated lard has little in common with homemade naturally rendered lard, but I was feeling nostalgic and used it.

 

 

I made biscuits (see recipe below):

 

 



 They were wonderful! Very light and flaky. If you've never eaten a biscuit made with lard, you are in for a treat. Here's the recipe:

Light and Airy Lard Biscuits

 

2 cups flour

4 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. salt

3 T. lard

3/4 cup milk

 

In a medium mixing bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Cut in the lard with a fork until the mixture resembles coarse crumbles. Make a well in the middle and add the milk all at once. Mix with the fork until a soft dough forms. Then use one of your hands to gently knead the dough right in the bowl, about 10-15 times. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and roll to 1/2-inch thick. Cut with a biscuit or cookie cutter and place the biscuits on a greased baking sheet.

 

Bake in a preheated 450-degree oven for 12 minutes.

 

While the biscuits were baking I whipped up a batch of sausage gravy:

 

 



Give lard a try. I think you'll agree that your baked goods will taste better.

Blessings!
Georgia



Quick and Easy Cloverleaf Dinner Rolls

I'm writing a baking cookbook currrently and realized it would be nice to add a Cloverleaf Dinner Rolls recipe. I looked in my cookbooks for inspiration and in an old, out-of-print book (that wasn't even a cookbook!) I found a recipe for cloverleaf dinner rolls that could allegedly be made in 30 minutes.

Too good to be true! I thought.

Turns out I was right. The ingredients list was totally out of whack and what I ended up with was a gooey mess. Certainly not anything resembling a yeast-raised bread dough.

But the idea intrigued me, so I left the computer and the book writing, put on an apron, and started experimenting. I loved the idea of a quick dinner roll recipe--one that could be ready in a hurry for those times when you suddenly have more people than you were expecting to feed, or you realize that dinner will be slim pickings otherwise--so I knew that I had to keep that thought in mind.

Following is the recipe that I came up with. They are tasty, have a lovely soft texture, and are really, really good slathered with butter! Here's a picture of the finished result:

Quick Cloverleaf Rolls

2¼ tsp. (1 package) active dry yeast

1¼ cups warm water

¼ cup sugar

½ tsp. salt (I think a bit more salt might be good, but cook's choice)

2 eggs

2 T. oil

4½-5 cups flour

butter (optional)

In a large mixing bowl, dissolve yeast in the warm water to which a pinch of sugar has been added. Let set for 10 minutes. Add the sugar and salt and mix together. Beat in eggs one at a time, using an electric mixer if you have one, or else vigorously with a large wooden spoon. Add oil and beat again to blend.

Gradually beat in 2-3 cups flour and keep beating the mixture for 3 minutes. By hand, continue to add flour until the dough begins to form a soft ball and leave the sides of the bowl.

Turn out ball of dough on a floured surface and, with buttered hands, gently knead for 3 minutes, adding small bits of flour if necessary. This dough is very soft and sticky, but persevere. Keeping your hands buttered will help.

Grease a muffin tin. Keeping your hands well buttered, break off small pieces of dough and roll into balls about the size of large marbles. Place three balls of dough in each muffin tin cup and gently press down.

Cover and let rise in a warm place for about 30 minutes.

Bake in a preheated 400° oven for 15-17 minutes or until done. Remove from oven and immediately brush the tops with butter. Remove the rolls from the muffin tin cups and place on a rack to cool.

These are worth making. They are simple and quick. And if you time things right, they should come out of the oven just minutes before dinner is served; the aroma will surely bring your loved ones to the table in a hurry!

May God richly bless you and your loved ones.

Enjoy!

One Potato, Two Potato...

Pre-summer is upon us here in the Pacific Northwest!

This is the season when gardeners in my area kick into high gear in the vegetable patch. We haul out our tillers, broad forks, shovels, and hoes and get busy readying our soil to accept summer's bounty...whether in the form of seeds, starts, or by simply weeding around permanent plantings such as fruit trees, grape vines, or blueberry bushes.

Potato planting time is always a highlight for me. It's ridiculously easy to plant, tend, and harvest potatoes. Really a beginning gardener's friend. And if you've never eaten a fresh-from-the-garden potato, you're in for a treat--and quite possibly a surprise, too. They are dense, sweet treats, with delicate, thin skins just perfect for buttering and eating. There's no need to add a lot of fancy ingredients--just bake, butter, and enjoy.

To plant potatoes, this is what I've done for years and is considered blasphemy by some folks, but it works for me: Toward the very end of winter, I keep back around 5 pounds of the potatoes (organic) that I've bought in the grocery store. Out they go into my cold garage, whereupon they eventually begin to sprout from the potato "eyes."

When a likely day appears in the garden (in my area, it's usually sometime in early May), I take those potatoes and plant them about 4 inches deep, making sure there is at least one sprouting "eye" for each tuber that I plant. In years' past I've taken the time to cut larger potatoes into pieces in order to get more starts and, theoretically, more eventual potatoes, but I believe I have my best success by simply planting whole potatoes, no matter how big they are. I have no idea why this is, but my gut tells me it's because we have very wet springs here and the cut portions tend to rot faster than the intact potatoes.

When the potato plants emerge, I occasionally add well-composted soil and/or straw to increase the depth at which the tubers are maturing. You'll find that some of the potatoes want to stick through the soil...and if that happens, those potatoes will turn green...and green skins on potatoes are toxic. So I do my best to keep my potatoes well hidden under a protective covering.

After some time growing, you'll notice blossoms on your plants. I think they are actually quite pretty--plus I know what's coming soon, so that makes them even prettier, in my opinion.

When the potato plants begin to die back you can begin to harvest the tubers. Carefully dig down and collect them. You'll be amazed at how many you get!

One of my sons and his wife recently bought their first home and promptly put in a vegetable garden. I went over to exclaim on their wonderful new garden and hear them tell me in minute detail just how they did it. They were so proud of their efforts and kept talking about "eating clean and fresh." And then the best moment came when my son looked at me and smiled and said, "Remember how we used to love to go outside and dig up potatoes for dinner?"

Frankly it amazed me that this was his recollection because my recollection is that when he and his brothers were required to go dig up potatoes, they sometimes carried on as if I was about the meanest mom on the planet.

And then I turned to watch my sweet little grandson (age 2) happily digging in the dirt. And I had to smile because I know that soon it will be his turn to dig up potatoes for dinner, and he'll likely gripe about the forced labor just like his dad did.

It's the circle of life, and it's good.

Chewy Oatmeal Cookies with a Little Something Extra

I've been messing with oatmeal cookie recipes lately because one of my sons wanted a plain oatmeal cookie that was chewy. Since I wouldn't be including any add-ons such as nuts or raisins, I decided to experiment with taste. And if my sons are any indication of success, then I have a winner with this recipe. For your pleasure I present:

Chewy Oatmeal Cookies



 1 cup butter, softened
1 cup white sugar
1 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
2 cups flour (you can use all-purpose or whole wheat, or a combination)
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt, scant
1 1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp. ground cardamom seed
1/4 tsp. ground nutmeg
3 cups oatmeal

In a large mixing bowl, beat together the butter and white and brown sugars until creamy. Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Stir in vanilla and mix well.

In another, smaller mixing bowl, combine flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, cardamom, and nutmeg. Add to the creamed mixture and stir well to combine. (At this juncture, I use a large wooden spoon, but you can also use a mixer.) Add oats and mix well.

Cover bowl and chill dough for at least an hour.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Grease cookie sheets. Roll the dough into balls the size of walnuts and place 2 inches apart on the greased cookie sheets. Dip a fork into white sugar (there will be very little sticking to the fork) and then slightly flatten the tops of the balls, sliding the fork across the surface to release the sugar.

Bake 8 - 10 minutes. Allow cookies to cool for several minutes and then remove from cookie sheets and cool completely. You can use wire cooling racks or do what I do and put them on waxed or parchment paper.

The cardamom really adds a nice flavor to these cookies. They are great as is...but if you still have a hankering for those add-ons, feel free to mix a handful or two of raisins and/or walnuts into the dough before chilling and baking.

I haven't tried this next idea yet, but I think it would work: roll the dough balls in sugar to coat completely and then set them on the greased cookie sheets. Flatten slightly or leave them as is and bake according to the above directions.

Enjoy!

Plain and simple living at its homemade best,

Georgia

Quick and Easy Lentil Soup

Two facts you need to know right at the start of things:
1) I'm writing a baking book currently, and 2) I had a doctor's appointment last week.

Now to the story: The sad, ugly truth is that I've been gaining weight. I'd like to blame it on my age or hormones, but the fact is, I'm a very good cook. In fact, I consider myself an excellent cook when taking into consideration my personal taste buds. And that makes total sense because when we're the cooks, we get to set the flavor to our personal taste preferences. Add to that the baking book...with the requisite taste testing and "making sure" the ingredients got listed correctly and you can see that my weight gain was inevitable.

Now to the doctor's visit: The doc I saw this last time is very nice, and we have a good relationship, which unfortunately is what possibly made it so easy for her to comment, although to her credit she hemmed and hawed a bit first. Basically she told me that I need to stop eating what I'm writing about and lose some pounds before my next visit.

I stepped on the scale and was pretty horrified. I really need to lose 20 pounds, but if I only lost 10 I'd be happy. I'm not fat per se; just hearty looking. It's not as if this took me by complete surprise, however, because my clothes have been getting tighter and tighter. I eat very healthily, but I just plain eat too much of what I cook. Portion control is my nemesis.

So I decided to take matters in hand and change some of my habits. I've started lifting weights (tiny ones, but still...) and doing crunches and walking two miles most days. B utthe hardest part is that I've begun eating a spartan diet. In the morning I make a smoothie with two handfuls of organic greens and then some fruit and coconut milk or water. I add a couple tablespoons of sunflower seeds, raw pine nuts, or raw almonds for some protein and it gets me by until lunch, but just barely. I do the same for dinner.

But lunch! Lunch is when I have a real meal, although I'm taking care to eat smaller amounts and forego the good stuff like rice and potatoes and gravy. Today's lunch (with enough for tomorrow too) was:

Quick and Easy Lentil Soup

 

1 quart canned tomatoes with their juice (if you don't can your own, you can use one or two cans of store-bought tomatoes)

3 cups water

2 tsp. organic Better Than Bouillon, beef flavor (I get jars of this at Costco and it's great stuff) or just use whatever bouillon you have on hand...or don't use any at all

1 cup lentils

2 cups baby carrots

2 stalks celery, chopped

1/2 onion, chopped

1 tsp. curry powder, or to taste

1/2 tsp. coriander, or to taste

1/4 tsp. minced garlic, or to taste

 

I mixed all the ingredients into my 6-quart pressure cooker (which is a real time saver and I highly recommend them. Just make sure you get a stainless steel pressure cooker, not an aluminum one). Then I turned the heat to high and when the petcock started rocking, I turned down the heat just a tad and set the timer for five minutes. After five minutes I took the pot off the heat and let it cool on its own without putting under cold water; that took about another 10 minutes. Dinner was served and it was very, very good. And even better? It was low calorie and very healthy and hopefully will help me lose some weight.

 

Now if you don't have a pressure cooker, you can still cook up this soup, but you'll need to let it simmer on the stove for probably somewhere around an hour, or until the lentils are soft enough for your taste. If you don't use bouillon, you'll need to add some salt and pepper to taste also.

 

That's all I had for lunch today, but if you aren't needing to eat like a bird, add biscuits or cornbread or even just a piece of bread and butter alongside the soup. Yum!

 

Next I'm going to experiment with whole wheat tortilla wraps. I'm already contemplating the ingredients I'll use and if they turn out well, I'll write about my results. But I can already tell you that they will be heavy on veggies and low on calories.

 

And three months from now I'm going to waltz into that doctor's office, toned and svelte, and expect her to make much of the new, lesser me.

 



Oven Roasted Vegetables with Lime and Pine Nuts

Winter is still with us here in the Pacific Northwest, and because we get so much cool season rain, it can get a bit dreary this time of year.

Seed catalogs have begun arriving and my thoughts have turned to my summer garden. Last week I did manage to "mud in" my first planting of shelling peas and every day I wander outside and urge them to grow. But in this chilly, wet weather, growing is tough business, and it seems those little pea plants take forever to emerge. But emerge they eventually do, and that more than anything else portends warmer, sunnier days ahead. But patience is a virtue, and sometimes I need more than the promise of spring to come.

So this week I went to the grocery store and bought veggies. Lots and lots of veggies. And when I got home I quickly realized that I would need to make meals that consisted of nothing but those vegetables or they would wilt and turn bad before I got them all eaten.

What to do?

The answer was easy: roast them. Usually when I roast vegetables I'm not very creative; I simply spritz them with olive oil, add salt, pepper, garlic, and rosemary and call it good. But this time I was yearning for something different, so I opened up my refrigerator and looked inside. And this is what I came up with:

Oven Roasted Vegetables with Lime and Pine Nuts

Oh my goodness, it was a taste hit! The addition of lime juice really brightened the taste of the vegetables and I plan to do it again soon. Here's a picture of my first bowl:

I will now give you the ingredients along with a rough guesstimate of the amounts. I'm the kind of cook that adds ingredients by mental "taste" instead of being a rigorous measurer. It makes it a bit harder to write out my recipes, but I also like to think it frees up you, dear reader, to be creative in your own right and add the amounts you think are perfect. So here goes:


1 zucchini
1/2 onion
1 large tomato
8 small Russian fingerling potatoes
8 petit button mushrooms
1 carrot
1/2 cup eggplant, skinned and chunked into 1/2-inch cubes (these will be smaller than the other vegetable pieces, but I like it better with the eggplant...but suit yourself)
1/2 cup bell pepper
3 tablespoons pine nuts
1-2 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 tsp. thyme
1/8 cup lime juice (more or less)
salt and pepper to taste
olive oil

Chunk the zucchini, onion, tomato, carrot, and pepper into large, similar sized pieces. If the mushrooms or potatoes seem a bit large, cut them in half also; otherwise leave them whole.

Spray a cookie sheet or baking pan with olive oil and also spray the veggies. Mix them together with the pine nuts, garlic, thyme, and salt and pepper and place them in the baking pan. Drizzle the lime juice over the veggies, being careful to hit all surfaces.

Roast for about 20 minutes in a 400 degree oven; gently turn vegetables and continue to bake until the edges begin to brown and the vegetables are tender, about another 15 minutes, depending on the size of the chunks.

If the vegetables start getting too dark, turn the oven down to 325 degrees and continue to roast them until they are tender.

You can obviously eat these plain, and with a piece of excellent sourdough bread and butter or a baked chicken breast you have a delightful meal. But here's another idea: Toast a hoagie type roll, spread the toasted roll with a bit of mayonnaise, and pile the veggies on top for a wonderful roasted vegetable sandwich. Quite elegant and very tasty!

Eating plenty of fresh veggies during these dark and dreary winter months helps keep me going until once again the days lengthen, the sun comes out, and my garden grows.

Blessings to you and yours and happy (and healthy!) eating!
Georgia

The Chickens and the Eggs

What came first--the chicken or the egg?

Well in my case, it was the chicken.

I bought 3 day-old pullets last summer--too late to get eggs before the cold, short days of winter came, but I figured their extra growing time would stand my egg production in good stead. So I fed Henrietta, Laycey, and Megg (who I've subsequently lost to a racoon...very sad) organic feed and cracked corn, along with suitable kitchen scraps. On extra cold days, I make extra oatmeal or hot farina when cooking my own breakfast so I have enough to give them a warm breakfast. They love the treat!

On the morning of January 16th of this year, I heard the girls out back clucking and realized the sound was different--it was the sound a hen makes when she's announcing that she's just laid an egg. I waited several more minutes and then hurried outside to see what was up, and sure enough, there was a fresh, warm egg in the hen house. Oh boy! I was in business!

On day two both of my hens laid an egg, and they've been doing that every single day since. That's slightly more than a dozen each week. I'm thrilled, and it's also true that I'm quickly being inundated with fresh, organic eggs:

 



You've never truly had a fresh egg until you've had one straight from the hen house. The yolks are bright orange/yellow and the whites just sit there in a hump instead of spreading out in the pan when you crack them open. And they taste...well...eggy. Divine!

But since I'm so egg rich I've been attempting to make food that uses a good share of eggs just to try to keep up with the onslaught. Here are some of the recipes I've made recently:

Cream Puffs

 1 cup water
1/2 cup butter (1 stick)
1 tsp. sugar
1/4 tsp. salt
1 cup flour, sifted
4 eggs
sweetened whipped cream

Heat the water, butter, sugar, and salt to a full rolling boil in a large saucepan. Add the flour all at once. Stir vigorously with a wooden spoon until mixture forms a thick, smooth ball that leavers the sides of the pan clean, about 1 minute. Remove from heat. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating with the wooden spoon well after each addition, until paste is shiny and smooth. This takes a while.

The pastry will be sticky, but do your best to shape into puffs. I usually make mine about two inches across; you don't want them too large or they won't get dry enough in the center when baked. Place them on an ungreased cookie sheet and bake at 425 degrees for 15 minutes; reduce heat to 375 degrees and bake for 5 more minutes. Cut a slash in the side of each puff about two-thirds of the way down (I use a sharp knife for this and poke the knife into the center and then slash while taking it back out) and continue baking for 10 minutes or until puffs are firm, dry to the touch, and golden brown. Cool on a wire rack. Cut tops off, fill with sweetened whipped cream, place tops back on top of the whipped cream, and serve.

I make homemade sweetened whipped cream by adding to 1 cup whipping cream about 1/8 cup of sugar, a pinch of cream of tartar (it helps to keep the whipped cream from separating; if you don't have any, don't worry), and about 1/4 - 1/2 teaspoon vanilla. I use my electric beaters for this step, and beat the cream until stiff peaks form and it looks about right.

I usually double this recipe and get to use up 8 eggs in a hurry. But when I do double the recipe, my arms about fall off after I've beaten in all those eggs into the paste. Consider it your exercise for the day.

Chocolate Chiffon Cake

 

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

 

Whisk together 3/4 cup boiling water and 1/2 cup cocoa powder (unsweetened). Allow to cool and then whisk in 1/2 cup vegetable oil, 5 room temperature egg yolks (save the whites for later in the recipe), and 1 teaspoon vanilla.

 

In a large mixing bowl whisk together 1 3/4 cups sifted cake flour, 1 1/4 cups sugar, 2 teaspoons baking powder, 1/4 teaspoon baking soda, and 1/2 teaspoon salt. Add the cocoa mixture and whisk until smooth.

 

In another large, clean mixing bowl and using clean electric beaters, beat 8 room temperature egg whites and 1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar until soft peaks form. Turn speed to high and gradually beat in 1/4 cup sugar; beat until the peaks are very stiff.

 

Use a rubber spatual to fold a quarter of the egg whites into the cocoa mixture, then fold in the remaining whites. Scrape the batter into an ungreased 10-inch tube pan and spread evenly. Bake for 55-60 minutes or until the top springs back when lightly pressed and a toothpick inserted just off center comes out clean. Invert the cake to cool. My cakes are too high to invert without smashing so I use an upside down canning jar, but you can also use a coke or wine bottle or an upside down canning funnel. Let the cake cool for about 1-2 hours.

 

To remove the chiffon cake from the tube pan, use a knife to go around the edge of the pan to loosen it and then gently tap it out onto a clean counter or serving plate.

 

I often serve this with sweetened whipped cream or spoon sweetened berries over the top and put a scoop of vanilla ice cream on the side.

 

 

Make these two recipes, doubling the cream puffs, and you'll use 16 eggs in a hurry. And even better? Your family will rise up and call you blessed!