Lard Part 2: Cooking with Lard

I promised that part two of my lard series would be about cooking with lard.  I'm very tempted to jump ahead to step three, now that I have picked up the biggest sack of pig fat I've ever seen from Rettland Farm....

...but the lard making will have to wait!  I will start with a couple of my favorite recipes using it.  The first, from a cookbook called More With Less: Recipes and Suggestions By Mennonites on How to Eat Better and Consume Less of the World's Resources is a basic recipe for refried beans.  I know, I know, most people hate refried beans.  But I LOVE them.  For a short time after I got married, I bought the canned refried beans from the store, and never thought anything of it.  Then one day I looked at the label and saw "lard" and I thought, "Well that can't be good for me!"  And I gave up eating them.  Fast forward a good many years, and a good many cookbooks, books and food documentaries later, and I come to find out that lard (properly sourced) isn't bad for you!  In fact, it's a very healthy alternative to the processed fats found in the grocery store.  (See my previous blog post on lard for more info.)  Around the same time, it also happened that one of the cookbook bees in my kitchen bonnet was More With Less which had a super simple recipe for refried beans.  I had to try it!  And once I did, I never went back to canned refried beans.  I make these in a fairly large batch--often doubling or tripling the recipe below.  Then, I place two cups of the beans into a quart sized ziplock bag, shmush the bag flat, and freeze the beans in little piles.  These make the BEST mexican dips, nachos, wraps, etc. and are especially nice to have on hand for meatless Fridays in Lent!  Here is the recipe from "More With Less."

I realize this looks like dog barf, but I promise, it doesn't taste like it!

Bagged Beans

Mexican Refried Beans

1.  Soak overnight 1lb. dried pinto, pink or kidney beans.

2.  Add: 6 cups water and 2 chopped onions (optional, but I would never leave them out!)

3.  Bring to a boil, cover and simmer until beans are tender (about 3 hours).  I also do this in my crockpot, just letting the beans cook until they are pretty mushy.

(Although it doesn't say so, if there's still too much liquid in the beans, I drain some of the liquid off at this point.)

4.  Mash beans with a potato masher (I use my immersion blender.)

5.  Add 1/2 cup hot bacon drippings or lard.

6.  Mix well and continue cooking, stirring frequently until the beans are thickened and the fat is absorbed.

Salt to taste and add optional seasonings like chili powder, cumin, etc.  (I leave them plain for picky children.)

Pie Crusts

I have used lard often as an ingredient in pie crusts, turnovers, or empanadas.  Lard makes pastry tasty and fluffy.  I don't have a standard pie crust recipe, because unfortunately I'm one of those people that likes to try new recipes all the time.  I've used the one from King Arthur Flour's website numerous times with wonderful results.  A quick Google search will reveal tons of lard pie crusts.  In fact, just out of curiosity, I Googled it again today, and imagine my joy when I stumbled upon this book:  Lard: The Lost Art of Cooking with Your Grandmother's Secret Ingredient by the editors of Grit Magazine! (This might be one I have to get my hands on soon!)  The MotherEarth News website has given us a preview of the pie crust recipe from the book, which I am including below.  

Ingredients:

3 cups all-purpose unbleached flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/4 cups lard, cold and coarsely chopped
1 egg
5 1/2 tablespoons water
1 teaspoon vinegar 

Instructions:

In a large bowl, combine the flour and salt. Using a pastry blender, cut in the lard until the mixture is very fine. In a separate bowl, beat together the egg, water, and vinegar.

Make a small well in the flour mixture and add the liquid; mix just until the dough comes together in a ball. Divide the dough into 4 equal pieces and flatten into disks; wrap individually in plastic and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes before rolling.

To make a double-crust pie with a solid top crust, roll out 2 disks of dough about 1 inch larger than the pie plate. Fit one crust into the bottom of the pie plate. Fill the pie with the desired filling; slightly moisten the edge of the bottom crust. Take the second crust, fold it in half, gently place it over the pie filling, and unfold, centering it on the pie plate; press the edges into the bottom crust to seal. Trim the excess dough to leave an overhang of about 3/4 inch. Crimp or flute the edges with your fingers. To allow steam to escape, gently prick the top crust with a fork several times or slash vents with a sharp knife.  (Makes 4 single or 2 double pie crusts)

Biscuits and Scones!

The only time I ever made successful biscuits was when I used lard.  Oh my gosh, they were terrific, flaky, and dangerous enough that I haven't made them again because my children went nutty over them.  Don't get me wrong, it's nice when they like my cooking, but since I am trying to move them away from the "Beige Carbohydrate Diet" that they crave so much, making another batch of biscuits seemed like a bad idea!  I can't remember which recipe I used for the biscuits, but again, Google to the rescue!  I think these Ham and Cheese Lard Biscuits by Emeril Legasse sound like heaven, especially if you are using some ham or bacon from Rettland Farm!  :-)   

I can't talk about cooking without admitting my Downton Abbey obsession.  One of the things I love about the show, aside from that hysterical Maggie Smith, is the food culture it portrays.  Many scenes with the servants happen in the kitchen, where something is always cooking.  And its seems the family is constantly around some table or other, eating or having tea.  During these scenes, I feel like I spend an unusual amount of time trying to figure out what they are actually eating!  Well, no longer do I have to wonder!  This website is devoted ENTIRELY to the food (and food culture) of Downton Abbey and that period in history.  (Could the Foodie Downton-Wannabies of the world be any happier???!!)  On that website I found a scone recipe, and feel pretty certain it will be making an appearance in our house soon.  I am no chef, but I wonder if a little lard/butter combination, or even substituting all lard in the scone recipe would make them even fluffier?    

My friend Kristina, who knew I was doing this "lard series" brought over an entire crateful of wonderful old cookbooks/homemaking books.  Some of these, no joke, are from the late 1800s and early 1900s.  Looking through the books this week has felt like taking a stroll back in time.  (I appreciated this experience so much, as I often feel that I was born in the wrong one!)  I thought I'd share a recipe or two from my favorite book of the bunch.  The title: A Thousand Ways to Please a Husband.  (No good Catholic blogger could post a book with such a title if it hadn't been written in 1917!)

If you have any favorite lard recipes, be sure to send them my way!  Hopefully I'll have a nice tub of it to put to use soon!  And stay tuned for the last installment, where I will document the lard-making process!  Can't wait!