Jamie Bissonnette's Pork Butter 3 Ways

Have you ever had one of those moments where you realize that you live in a bubble?  A strange, wonderful, delicious and healthy bubble, but a bubble none-the-less?  We've had a couple of those moments over the last few years as we've gotten deeper into the real/local/slow food scene.  Most recently at a local Westin A. Price Foundation meeting we shared our truffled pork butter, spread on toasted baguette, drizzled with honey and sprinkled with sea salt with the group.  I've never seen people so universally accept and appreciate spreadable, seasoned lard - a product I imagine many would shudder to consider eating.  

It made me think that we could really make some money selling products like this in our shop once it finally opens, but then I stepped back and questioned - is this for real?  Would other people be as into this product?  Or are we in a bubble?!  For those of you that are intrigued (and even those of you who are shuddering) Check out how we make it and give it a try if you're so inclined.  Taste it if you dare, and tell us what you think!  Or, serve it to unsuspecting family and friends without telling them what it is - I can't wait to hear if they like it.

The Process

Start with lots of pork fat.  Yes, lots and lots of pork fat.  Like five pounds of pork fat.  This is a great recipe to try if you ever buy a whole hog from a farmer.  You'll probably end up with more fat than you know what to do with - and voila - you've already got a pork butter recipe!

We chop the fat into reasonably sized chunks, then grind them in our meat grinder.  If you don't have a huge, over-sized grinder like we do, you can use a KitchenAid grinder attachment or even a food processor to grind the fat.  If you don't have any of those tools you can just dice the fat as small as you can do safely.  Fat is easier to chop when it's really cold, so keep that in mind if you go that route.

 

Throw your ground meat and the seasonings (wine, water, herbs and garlic) into a pot or crockpot and let it all simmer away on low for 2-4 hours.  The speed the fat renders at depends greatly on how finely you chopped or ground it, but it's crucial that you keep the heat low so that you don't burn the cracklings and give the pork butter a chicharones kind of flavor.  After an hour or so a lot of fat will be fully rendered and liquid.  As the rendering continues, the little bits that haven't rendered will start to turn golden brown.  As soon as these bits even start remotely browning we strain off all the delicious liquid setting the cracklings aside.  If you're into eating cracklings (I haven't really found the best way to eat them yet - I'm waiting to be converted, though!) throw them back on the stove and let them simmer until they are nicely browned to your liking.  I don't have the secret sauce here.  

Strain the rendered lard into a container that you can let it cool in.  We strain through a fine mesh strainer, then do a second strain through cheesecloth so that we get rid of any little bits.  For this recipe you need to let the lard fully harden in the refrigerator before whipping and adding the final seasonings. 

 So, here's where it gets good.  If you make enough of the base lard you can try all of these flavors to see which you prefer.  We started with five pounds of lard and were able to get six cups of rendered lard from that batch - which allowed us to do a 2 cup recipe of each flavor.  If you don't start with ground fat you might not have as high of a yield, so you'll have to pick your poison as far as the seasonings go.  There's the "Pepperoni Pizza" Pork Butter that wants to be slathered on focaccia and sprinkled with finely chopped basil.  And, there's the tried and true "Black Truffle Honey" Pork Butter that just needs a sprinkle of sea salt on a baguette or the "Salty/Savory/Sweet" flavor that smells like a Thai restaurant in the best possible way.  I want to sautee green beans in it.  Oh, and it's good straight out of the jar...

The final step of the process is to put two cups of the cooled rendered lard into the mixer with the paddle attachment, mix in the seasonings on a low speed, then whip it up for a minute or so until the texture is light and airy like a whipped butter!

 Scrape it all down, don't waste a drop, and package it up.  You could roll it in parchment paper to make a cube of "butter" or you could pack it in little mason jars.  We like to use the 4 oz mason jars that are so cute.  They make great gifts if you have the kind of friends and family that wants healthy yet decadent little treats like this!

Recipe

Ok.  The recipe is as follows - adapted from Jamie Bissonnette's "The New Charcuterie."

Rendered Lard Base

Ingredients

5 lb (2kg) pork fat (any type, hard or soft)
1 cup (237 ml) dry white wine
1 cup (237 ml) water
5 cloves garlic
1 fresh bay leaf
3 sprigs fresh thyme

Directions

Grind the pork fat or dice into small cubes.  Use a crockpot or a very heavy-bottomed Dutch oven with a lid.  Put everything in the pot.

If using a crockpot, cook 1 hour on high, then 1-2 hours on low.  If using a Dutch oven cook on low 2-3 hours, stirring every 10-15 minutes.  These times are shorter than in the original recipe.  If you grind the fat it will render much faster.

Once the pork fat is cooked, strain it through a fine-mesh sieve.  Place it in a bowl or casserole dish and let cool until it's firm like butter.

Salty/Savory/Sweet Version

Ingredients

1 tbsp (15g) green curry
1 tbsp (15g) sugar
1 tbsp (15ml) lime juice
1 tsp (5g) chopped garlic
2 tbsp (30ml) fish sauce
1 tsp (5g) course sea salt or fleur de sel

Directions

Once the rendered lard base is firm, put 2 cups (473ml) in an electric mixer with a paddle attachment and add green curry, sugar, lime juice, garlic and fish sauce.  Cream until it resembles whipped butter then transfer to a dish for serving, or storing.

Black Truffle Honey Butter

Ingredients

1 tbsp (15g) chopped rosemary
1 tbsp (15ml) honey
1/4 tsp (1.5ml) truffle oil (feel free to substitute real truffle if you have the money and inclination!  2 tbsp (30f) fresh, chopped black truffles will do the trick

Directions

Once the rendered lard base is firm, put 2 cups (473ml) in an electric mixer with a paddle attachment and add the rosemary, honey and truffle oil (or by all means add those real truffles!!)  Cream until its the consistency of whipped butter then transfer to a dish for serving, or storing.

Pepperoni Pizza Flavored Lardo

Ingredients

1 tsp (15g) paprika
1 tsp (5g) red chili flakes
1 tsp (5g) granulated garlic
1 tsp (5g) ground black pepper
1tsp (15ml) olive oil
1 tsp (5g) sea salt

Directions

Once the rendered lard base is firm, put 2 cups (473ml) in an electric mixer with a paddle attachment and add the paprika, red chili flakes, granulated garlic, ground black pepper, olive oil and sea salt.  Cream until its the consistency of whipped butter then transfer to a dish for serving, or storing.

Inspiration Everywhere!

Andy and I have descended on our old stomping grounds!  Back in Phoenix for a week to spend the holidays with the Harper family.  Between tree decorating and gift wrapping we managed to sneak out for a few hours to troll around Phoenix, Arcadia, and Scottsdale for some architecture and design inspiration for the Hank & Hazel's building.  We had a few hiccups with our building that slowed us down for a few months this fall, but now we're in the clear and raring to get this thing renovated so we can open this business we're so excited to share with you all!

So- first things first.  Here are some pictures of the building.  From the exterior you can see that it looks a really lame furniture store.  The kind you would never shop in!!  And from the inside, I wanted you to see a picture of the cool roof - it's a wood roof in a barrel shape.  So cool and old-fashioned.  Trust me - they don't build 'em like this anymore!  What we're working on now is how to make this pretty uncool building have a hip, old-timey vibe.

Future home of Hank & Hazel's!

Here's the roof - we want to try to leave at least part of it exposed so it can add to the old-fashioned feel of our market. 

 On our tour of hip, cool food businesses in Phoenix here are a few of our stops (and the learnings we're taking back to our architect!)

Learning #1: Find cool ways to merchandise your products on antique hutches, rolling wooden shelves, branded coolers, etc.

 


Learning #2: Paint cool signage- it's cheap and makes a huge impact (and we have LOTS of exterior wall that needs treatment!)

Learning #3: Offer 15, 16, 17, 18 or 19 minute parking spots.  I swear we saw one of each on our tour.  This one is my favorite!  Since we were just popping in at most of these places we used this feature almost everywhere.

Learning #4: The outdoor patio is key.  Put landscaping in movable containers and use lots of wood to make an inviting space for people to spend time in.

Learning #5: Be small, not big.  You feel so much better in a space that is full of both products and people.  When there's not enough stuff in a market it feels awkward.  And we all know how lame it is to be in a restaurant where there's only one other couple.  You start picking the place apart to try to figure out why you're the only sucker who's there while everyone else is across the street in the trendy new spot.

Delightfully full of interesting stuff!

Why am I the only one in here?!!?!?!?!?

Learning #6: Kids Corner - since we'll be having our own kid around the shop this is a no-brainer for us, but I loved seeing it at the Chestnut!  Andy's dad is hand carving a "rocking-pig" for us, and I want to fill up the rest with those Melissa & Doug food cutting toys and a kid's play kitchen, and a mini-shopping cart for toddlers to follow their parents around the store with.

Learning #7: A nice bathroom.  It makes a place seem so much cooler when even the restroom is nice and matches the decor of the venue.

The one thing we forgot to take a picture of on our tour of Phoenix was Saturday morning cocktail hour at Southern Rail with my super hip cousins Amy and Luke (who gave us the list of all the places we visited for inspiration and continue to send ideas pouring our way!)  Cheers!  

During our stay at the Newton, though, we did somehow catch a photo of Al Michaels doing a book signing at Changing Hands bookstore.  Nice...

So - these are a few of the things we picked up, but we want to hear from you!  What are your favorite features at places you frequent - restaurants, markets, butcher shops etc?  If you want to like our new facebook page: make a post and share some of your ideas with us!  Eventually I hope to start promoting our blog posts there so I can reserve my facebook page for just posting cute pictures of my baby (obviously what facebook was designed for!!)

A Very Meaty Birthday

I'm a terrible blogger.  I do awesome, cool stuff every day, but can't manage to take pictures of it all and write a few words to share it.  But, I'll make an exception today because I'm having a heck of a day and I actually remembered to snap some pics!

Andy and I have been very busy the last few months.  We've picked a name for our business: Hank & Hazel's Butcher Shop and Eatery, and we've just finished working with our graphic designer on our logo.  How cool is that?!

The logo!  Isn't it just too cute?

 In between meetings with our architect to design the renovations to the building we bought, and meetings with the City of Vacaville planning department, we've been going crazy with recipe development.  I have no excuse for not sharing with you all our progression from struggling to get the texture of our sausages right using the KitchenAid attachments, and forgetting to add curing salt to a full size ham(yikes!  What a waste!!), to some of our true successes - such as the homemade Pastrami Reuben that just melted in your mouth or our Bockwurst which is light and fluffy and so yum!

Which brings us to today - the day I will actually tell you about some of these adventures.  I got up really early so I could get out to Starbucks for my free birthday drink.  Venti Iced Americano - what a way to start the day!  By the time I got back to the house, Andy had gotten the Turchetta cooking in the sous vide and put yesterday's production of hot links into the smoker.  The Turchetta was my brother, Seamus' idea - its two turkey breasts seasoned with typical porchetta seasonings (but with sage as the dominant spice), rolled up in turkey skin and slow cooked for four hours.   See pics below!

Turchetta Spice Mix

The Turchetta.  Looks pretty cool, huh? 

Slicing it up - pretty delish!

For the Hot Links, Andy and I challenged ourselves to try to develop a recipe that would be better than my Dad's favorite "Evergood" hot links.  So, when we pulled our links from the smoker at like 9am, it seemed only right to cook up one of each and do a taste test.  I've had a lot of decadent birthdays over the years, but none have included a sausage taste-off before 10am.  Andy - thanks for keeping it interesting!  

The sausages just before coming out of the smoker!  I wish you all could have smelled it!

Cast Iron Cook-Off

The Evergood is redder, but ours has better smoke, more complex flavors and is bigger.  I feel like there is a really good sausage / size joke here, but I'll leave that to your imagination...

After all this, it's obviously time to start making some sausage, right?  After butchering up that turkey yesterday for the turchetta, we turned the rest of it into trim for Turkey Sausage with Tart Cherries (it should be mentioned that we reserved the drumsticks to smoke and make caveman style drummies for Andy and my Dad...obviously...)  Didn't get pics of the sausage making process - I promise I'll do a good job of that one of these days.

Now time to read all of the lovely birthday messages on Facebook and watch World Cup soccer with my amazing husband while the baby naps, before meeting up with my family for a birthday celebration filled with board games, dry-aged steaks and ice cream with caramel sauce.  Meatiest birthday I've ever had.  Thank you all for making it amazing!!

A Pork Chop By Any Other Name Would Smell As Sweet

Apologies for the radio silence the last few months!  Andy and I stayed very busy preparing for the baby and spending time with family over the holidays.  We were ready for the baby to arrive a few weeks early, but he didn't show up until nearly three weeks late, so we had a pretty extended last hurrah.  On January 12 we welcomed Harold Porter Harper into the family - he's tall, lanky and has red hair - so we are a little bit mystified about who he looks like.  (Is it possible that dying my hair red all those years could seep into my gene pool?)  Since he was born we've been working pretty much full time just trying to keep the little guy alive, but I think we're starting to get the hang of this parenting thing and we're ready to get busy on the butcher shop again (our 2nd baby!).

The Little Guy (looking pretty dapper...)

So - here's the question of the day: What should we name it?  Please leave a comment with absolutely any suggestions that you have for a cool name for our butcher shop.  Otherwise, we've developed two front runners that we're considering and we'd love it if you could weigh in and tell us which you think is better!  We're using the phrase "Local and Pastured Meats" in both names because we want the name to be very clear so that customers know what we're selling and how we're differentiated from other butchers.  We intend to source as locally as possible and to work with ranchers who share our philosophy of slow-grown animals raised naturally without hormones and antibiotics.

Option 1: Porter's Local and Pastured Meats
Porter is my family's name, and as we're living on the family ranch and back in my hometown it seems like a nice nod to the history of my family in this community.  We may grow the butcher shop into more of a market over time with other locally-sourced, sustainable products and produce.  Porter's is a strong name and could easily grow into "Porter's Market" down the road as we grow.

Option 2: Hank and Hazel's Local and Pastured Meats
As Andy and I decided to leave our corporate jobs and pursue this butcher shop concept, my Dad bought a pair of Mangalitsa breeding pigs.  He named the boar "Hank" after my grandpa, and named the sow "Hazel" after an adorable, young 2nd cousin of mine in Petaluma.  Hank and Hazel were in many ways the reason we took the leap to start this business, so it could be a great story to name the shop after them.  The name also seems kind of hip and catchy, and a little bit old-school - kind of like the business we're starting.

So, what do you think?  Please leave comments here or on Facebook!

Butcher Apprenticeship

Hi folks, It's Andy!  Sarah asked me to chime in on the blog and write about my Butcher's Apprenticeship with Fleisher's in New York.  Fleisher's is one of the top butcher shops in the country and was recently selected as the 5th best butcher shop in the US by The Daily Meal (food & drink media company).  Fleisher's specializes in whole animal butchery and uses the entire animal, letting nothing go to waste.  Fleisher's sources its meat from local New York farms.  All of the meat that comes in is pastured and fed a natural diet (i.e. grass-fed) with no hormones, antibiotics, etc.  Fleisher's is the real deal and this shop runs a lot of animals through each week.  My job is to break down whole animals into retail case-ready cuts......and I am loving it!     

Butcher Apprenticeship:

Both Sarah and I thought it would be a good idea if one of us knew how to cut meat since we are opening a butcher shop (it seemed like an important step)!  There are very few places that break down whole animals and are willing to train rookies in the lost art of craft butchery.  Fleisher's was the perfect fit!  Fleisher's loves to work with people passionate about whole animal butchery and provides an intensive 12-week apprenticeship program.  During the 12-weeks students learn to break lamb, pork, and beef while also learning the business of running a butcher shop.     

I am 8-weeks through my 12-week apprenticeship.  It has been a crazy adventure!!  Two months ago I was cranking out Excel spreadsheets and now I am tearing apart whole-animals!  Below, I have provided some of the highlights of my experience so far. 

Animal Delivery Day:  Animals typically come in on Monday and Tuesday.  There is a sense of thrill in the air when Mitch, the guy who delivers the animals, shows up with 20 sides of pig, 12 lambs, and 20 quarters of beef.  Mitch is ridiculously jacked from lifting animals all day!  Seeing all of the animals come in and digging your knives/saws in for those first cuts is awesome.  It is also sweet seeing the room, which on Tuesday is full of hanging carcasses, deplete to empty over the course of the week.

A fresh batch of lambs ready to butcher!!

Strength and Conditioning:  I am getting stronger every day.  All of the cutting and lifting is really improving my upper body strength.  I was ridiculously sore the first couple weeks!! Luckily, the soreness is going away and I am on a daily regimen of Advil and stretching!

The Butcher Boy!
(dry-aged ribs and loins in the background)

Knives:  I have a new knife fetish.  Every morning begins with a ritualistic knife sharpening.  It is very rhythmic and relaxing to sharpen knives.  I can tell my knife is sharp when I can easily shave off some of my arm hair!  My left arm has a huge bald spot!  

Using my incredibly sharp 8" breaking knife to break the shoulder off a pig.

The Band Saw:  I also now have a band saw fetish.  I was scared to use the band saw at first and I strictly adhere to my instructor's advice regarding the band saw:  "Respect the f*#k out of the band saw."  

There she is!  The band saw!

My New Diet:  I get to take home meat most nights.  It is part of the experience and it is really important to understand how to properly cook all of the different cuts.  In the beginning, I would just eat the meat with nothing else (no veggies, bread, etc. mainly because I was too tired to cook anything else after a long day of cutting!).  This all meat diet is right up my alley.  Sarah and the other apprentices, however, have convinced me to start introducing vegetables into the routine, so I have been slowly adding veggies to the diet!

Dinner is Served!  A true butcher's dinner!  No veggies allowed!

New York City:  NYC is amazing and there are so many things to do and good meals to eat!!  My favorite meal so far is the Momofuku Ramen from the Momofuku noodle bar in Manhattan.  Ridiculous!

The Momofuku Ramen with a beer and a glass of Sake!

Slaughter:  For some sick un-explainable reason, I really enjoy attending and participating in slaughters. There is something very exhilarating and exiting about the slaughter.  I really enjoy seeing the true farm to table process of a live animal to pork-chops and steaks!  I have included several photos of a pig slaughter and a goat slaughter.  If you are squeamish, I recommend looking away!    

Me "Sticking" the pig. 

Clean-up time!

Two fellow butchers, Hannah and Jon, skinning a goat.

Hannah cutting off the goat's head at the atlas joint.  

Master Butcher Hans Sebold pulling the insides of a recently slaughtered pig. 

Sausage Making:  I love making sausage!!  Mostly, I enjoy the recipe development.  I am currently working on a sausage inspired by a recipe from my old boss at Gallo who is from South Africa.  The sausage is a South African Boerewors and I call it, the "George."  

Camaraderie:  When you spend the entire day around a butcher's table cutting meat you develop great friendships with the other guys around the table.  I am doing the apprenticeship with two other students, Evan and David (Jonesy).  Jonesy and Evan have been a big part of my experience here in New York!  Evan is planning to open up a butcher shop in Grand Rapids, MI.  Jonesy is moving to Palo Alto after the apprenticeship and hopefully he will come help me cut meat out west!  The only thing better than breaking animals, is breaking animals with good people!

Evan Carrying a Lamb

  

Jonesy

Overall, the apprenticeship so far has been an incredible experience.  The stresses of being a butcher are much different than the stresses associated with corporate life.  At the end of each day, I am completely exhausted, but it is physical exhaustion vs. mental exhaustion.  I really enjoy seeing the meat come in and go out each week. I also get a great sense of achievement turning a room full of animal carcasses into beautiful case ready cuts, bacon, ham, sausage, stock, and other wonderful things!  The main negative here is being away from Sarah and the baby-on-the-way!  Only one month left until I get to go home to my beautiful wife and our new son to be.  Harold!