The Honest Plate

The myth, the legend: shortening.

A few weeks ago, I wrote a post on Feeding America, an amazing website (courtesy of Michigan State University) that provides high resolution scans of very old cookbooks (warning:  Feeding America is major derailer; if you have real work to do, best leave it alone).

I've been looking through several of the older cookbooks (pre-1920), and the curiosities in them are endless.  Desserts are king -- sometimes, half of the book is dedicated to cakes and pies (how much of this stuff did they used to eat?).  And just about every dessert requires an ingredient that we see less and less of today:  shortening.  Which got me wondering -- why do they call it shortening?  Why not just call it fat?  Where did the term shortening come from?

So off I went on mission to find out.  I consulted a few cookbooks (modern, that is), the web (the usual suspects:  Google, Wikipedia, et al) and McGee's On Food and Cooking.  Here's what I learned about the legendary shortening:

• Shortening (i.e. fat) refers to the effect it has on pastry dough, in that it results in a "shorter" baked product.  A shorter (or short) baked good is one that's tender, crumbly (not short in height, or size); hence:  shortbread, shortcake and short crust.  The word short, in fact, used to mean weak or pliable.
• Shortening has appeared in recipes for the last five- to six-hundred years; OED traces usage of the word as far back as the 15th century
• In 1911, Crisco hydrogenated vegetable oil was introduced to consumers; prior to this innovation, shortening consisted of a mixture of butter and lard
• Today, we know that shortening works by interfering with the wheat flour's ability to form long chain protein (gluten) strands, keeping them shorter and weaker...which is an interesting coincidence, considering that 600 years ago, our ancestors knew nothing of long chain proteins. 
• An example of a shortening/fat in action: a traditional baguette has no added fat/shortening and has a chewy, relatively tough texture (long chain proteins). However, a biscuit, composed of essentially the same ingredients as the baguette, does have fat/shortening (butter, lard, Crisco, etc).  The shortening gives the biscuit a light, fluffy, even crumbly texture (caused by weak, shortened protein chains) .
• A bit of a side note: many people believe that shortening (e.g., processed vegetable oil) produces pastry that's superior to lard or butter.  Part of this may be due to the fact that gas bubbles play an important role in the texture of pastry -- the more small gas bubbles, the more tender the crust.  McGee points out that modern shortening has a different structure than animal fats, allowing smaller bubbles to form and remain in the dough during baking.  Also, he notes that manufacturers "fill shortening with preformed bubbles of nitrogen (around 10% of the volume) and bubble stabilizing emulsifiers u(p to 3% of the shortening weight)."  Personally, that's enough to make processed vegetable shortening a deal-breaker (and I won't even get started on hydrogenation.)

For a fascinating etymology/history lesson on shortening, check out this post:  The Origins of Shortening

Good old-fashioned lard.

Lard has been making a come-back in the past few years.  Credit Mario Batali with kicking things off with lardo (cured fatback) back in 2003, at his Otto Enoteca Pizzeria in New York City.  Since then, chefs and pastry experts have embraced lard, and food writers such as Corby Kummer, Nina Planck and Melissa Clark have all but declared it trendy. 

And, as long as you don't buy lard in the dairy case in the supermarket (which is hydrogenated), real lard -- made from the hard, saturated fat surrounding the pig's kidneys -- is a real food.  There's minimal processing, it's traditional, and you can make it yourself.  Our grandparents and great grandparents knew that lard was good.  Lard is what makes pie crusts flaky/crunchy/melt-in-your-mouth; it's what makes anything fried extra-good; it's the ingredient that can make a lean dish taste magical.  What they didn't know (or probably care about) is the nutrition science of lard; in spite of the bad rap it has suffered until recently, lard is actually rich in monounsaturated fat, the kind that lowers LDL cholesterol and leaves HDL alone.

But what about rendering lard?  Much has been said and written about this process -- that it's messy, smelly, and time-consuming (taking up to eight hours).  But we uncovered a very easy, much faster way to render lard.  And no corners were cut with this recipe -- it yields an excellent product.

Rendered Leaf Lard:

1)  The first step may be the hardest:  find someone who can sell you leaf lard.  We've had luck at farmers markets; pig farmers carry it and will happily sell it to you.  For this recipe, we used a 2 lb portion.   
2)  Trim away any bloody or meaty-looking bits and discard.  Then, with a chef's knife, cut the lard into fine dice, e.g., 1/2 inch squares.
3)  Put the diced lard into a round or oval oven-proof vessel (we used a large Le Creuset pot).  Remember, you need to pour the liquid fat out -- a rectangular dish could make it a little tricky
4)  Place uncovered into a 325 oven.  No need to pre-heat; the pot and the fat can to be brought up to temperature with the oven.
5)  Allow the fat to render for about 2 hours; stir every 30 - 45 minutes or so.  When finished, you'll have quite a bit of clear, rendered pork fat and a good amount of golden-brown "cracklings"
6)  After removing from the oven, carefully pour the hot fat through a fine mesh strainer, and into a large ceramic bowl to allow it to cool.
7)  While still hot, dump the pork crisps onto a plate and season immediately with sea salt (paper towels placed on the plate can help absorb the excess fat.

The cracklings alone were nearly worth all the effort -- immediate gratification.  We used them the same way you'd use cold bacon:  salads, burgers and sandwiches.

But the lard itself will be used to make pie crust, a topic on which we'll post shortly.

Beak-to-tail.

So here's the deal -- if an animal (or plant) is going to give its life to us, the least we can do is use all of it.  Nose-to-tail, farm-to-table, whatever you want to call it, the goal is the same:  waste nothing.  Aim for maxiumum economy.  I mean, face it: life wasn't a trivial matter for the animal (or plant)! The honorable thing to do is to consume it slowly and incrementally, rather than gobbling it up all at once.

I bought a 5 ¼ lb duck yesterday, but before I did I made sure I knew exactly what I was going to do with every part.  Not that there’s anything to brag about here -- duck is easy.  All of it is good.

The run-down:

1)  Breast:  Duck Proscuitto.  This was, in fact, what compelled me to buy the duck in the first place.  Duck Proscuitto is incredible:  creamy, rich duck fat wrapped in dark, earthy, salty duck meat.  Preparing it is ridiculously easy -- no special charcuterie equipment or training required -- just requires a little patience.

Here is the process, adapted from James Peterson's The Duck Cookbook:

12 Juniper Berries
2 Tbl kosher salt
1/2 of a fresh large bay leaf, chopped finely
1/2 Tsp corriander seeds, crushed under a saucepan
10 black pepper corns, crushed under a saucepan
1 clove garlic, crushed and minced into fine paste
1 Whole duck breast (skin on), separated into two

Mix the dry ingredients and the garlic together to make the curing/seasoning salt.  Generously coat both sides of each half of the duck breast with the mixture.  Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 24 hours.  Remove plastic wrap and pat dry.  Wrap in a clean, thin towel or doubled-up cheesecloth, tie with string (as though making a sausage).  Hang in the refrigerator for 3 to 4 weeks -- when the proscuitto is firm, it's done.

2)  Legs:  Roasted, Smoked Duck Legs.  Another super-easy preparation.  Place the two duck legs in a small to medium-sized baking dish. Trim all skin and extra fat off of the duck carcass, and cut into 1" (appx) square pieces; add the fat and skin to the baking dish with the duck legs.  The fat will render-out and help slow-cook/braise the legs.  Put into an oven and set to 350 (no need to preheat).  Cook for 2 hours, basting twice or so during the second hour.  When there done, you'd swear you had duck confit -- just add a little of the leftover seasoning salt (from the duck proscuitto) and it's ready to eat.

After the legs are slow-roasted, you can bring them to another level by hot smoking them. 

To do this, start a grill (charcoal is best).  When the coals cool down to medium heat (and if using charcoal, be sure coals are to one side for indirect heating) and get a handful of wood chips, which have been soaked for at least 30 min (I used oak, from wine barrels).  Add the chips to the fire, then put the cooked duck legs on the grill (but not directly over the coals) and cover.  Allow them to smoke for 20 to 30 minutes.

A great thing about duck legs -- it's very hard to overcook them.

3)  Fat:  Rendered in the oven (along with the legs).  When the legs are done, you'll have about 1 1/2 cups of beautiful duck fat.  Strain the fat with a fine mesh sieve, and put into a non-reactive container with a cover.  It will keep in the refrigerator for weeks -- perfect for cooking or even spread on toast with some sea salt.

4) Skin:  The skin, which we rendered into fat (in the duck leg preparation above), makes excellent duck cracklings.  Ariane Daugin, who runs the duck-centric specialty foods company D'Artagnan, used to have a restaurant in New York City (also called D'Artagnan); she served salted duck cracklings at the bar(!).  Immediately after the duck legs come out of the oven, remove the cracklings and sprinkle with salt (again, you can use the leftover seasoning/curing salt from the proscuitto).

5)  Carcass, wings, giblets:  Frozen, to be used later for duck stock.

6)  Liver:  Duck Liver Pate.  We put the livers (there seemed to be two packaged with our duck) in a cold sautee pan.  Add several tablespoons of good olive oil, two anchovies, a large smashed clove of garlic, and a spoon of capers (in vinegar).  Turn the heat to medium high, and let the livers cook through.  Dump the contents of the pan into a food processor.  Puree, adding a little more olive oil as it spins.  Season to taste.  Refrigerate and serve cold.

So this duck will be in my family’s life for many months -- we'll eat the smoked legs right away; the pate will last around a week; the duck fat several weeks.  The proscuitto will last us months, and the duck stock (which we'll freeze) will last as long as half a year.  And we’ll treasure and savor every bit. 

I like to imagine that the duck (or whatever meat or produce I've purchased) cost me ten times as much as what I paid at the cash register; so instead of 5 1/4 lbs of duck for $13.05, it set me back $130.50.  (I know it sounds weird, but try it.)  I also try hard to remember that this food was once alive, talking with other animals, or vying for space with its neighbors.  With these things in mind it’s easy to appreciate the food we have, and elevates how precious its existence really is.

Scapes rule.

What's not to like about garlic scapes?  They're crunchy and fresh, suprisingly mild on the garlic-ness scale, and superlatively sustainable. As the unwanted shoots of young garlic, scapes would otherwise be tossed in the compost heap. Now farmers, chefs and home cooks are starting to appreciate them.  In fact, about a month ago, Melissa Clark of The New York Times, went into some detail about garlic scapes in A Garlic Festival Without a Single Clove.

So we picked some up over the weekend at the Farmer's Market in West Tisbury, on Martha's Vineyard.  And I'd say we got the last of them, as the season for scapes more or less over.  We prepared them simply with olive oil, salt, a few cloves of fresh minced garlic; sauteed at medium-high to medium until soft and just starting to carmelize; finished with a squeeze of lemon.  Totally declious, and tasting precisely of early summer. 

Back home in Providence, RI, we went to the Tuesday Farmers Market (there are one or more every day of the week) , and picked up a container of garlic scape pesto from Wishing Stone Farm. 

Scapes rule; one more thing to look forward to again next summer.