My friend, RuthAnn Zimmerman, and I chatted about this in great detail today. I hope you join in our conversation, via youtube or the podcast.

Are lard and tallow good fat?

Yes, both lard and tallow are good choices when it comes to fat. Today we’ll talk about both. First, lard…

We’re pig farmers here on our little New England farm & sugarbush, so I’m pretty enamored with lard. Lard is, quite simply, pig fat from their back and around their organs that has been heated up (“rendered”) and then strained, cooled, and stored. I’ve written a lot about it…

A Complete Guide to Pork Lard,

How to Render Lard,

How to Bake with Lard, and

I’ve shared recipes like Chicken Pot Pie &

Chocolate Chip Cookies made with lard.

My Friend, RuthAnn Zimmerman, is in love with Tallow

While I could talk on and on about lard (yeah, I know I’m weird like that), I know very little about tallow and have never rendered it or used it… except for tallow face serum and tallow balm that I love. (Use code SOULYRESTED to save on these if you’d like to experience the amazingness of what tallow does for your skin.)

So when I knew I wanted one episode in our current podcast season to focus on good fat, I immediately asked my friend, RuthAnn, if she’d join me for a deep dive into this topic.

Our whole season is focusing on Things we need in our diet daily & what we don’t know about them, from salt to veggies to sugar and fat. Follow the Simple Doesn’t Mean Easy podcast on your favorite podcast player for all the goodness this season. Find links here if you need them.

Join in on my fun conversation with RuthAnn via youtube or listen in on Apple Podcast here.

Here are some of RuthAnn’s insights into tallow:

What is tallow?

Tallow is made from fat that is sourced from a cow’s kidneys and heart (called “suet”). This is the purest fat on the cow. You can use other fat from the cow (found on their back and in other areas) but it will taste a little more “beefy” than the pure tallow.

Does tallow taste different than butter or margarine? 

Yes, tallow has a deeper, richer taste than what you’re used to if you bake with margarine, shortening, or butter.

What color is tallow?

Because it has some Vitamin D (but much less than lard), tallow can be a rich, yellow color, similar to butter, if the cow has been exposed to sunshine for many years.

Tips to rendering tallow?

RuthAnn Zimmerman’s full directions are here, in this video.

Don’t be deterred from trying it; it’s easier than you think. Low and slow is best, and patiently strain off any pieces of meat & break up large chunks of fat.

Realize that any beefy smell in your kitchen while rendering is good… this means the “beefy” taste is dissipating into the air.

Consider asking butcher if they can grind your suet, but ask if there is additional charge for this.

Feel free to toss your frozen suet right into your roaster for processing. It will melt and render fine in the pan.

For the best taste, avoid letting your tallow smoke as you’re rendering it.

Best uses for tallow?

Tallow is great for seasoning cast iron and using to make moisturizer/lotions.

Is tallow shelf-stable?

Yes, if it is rendered correctly tallow will not go rancid and is very shelf-stable.

What About Tallow Balm?

There is truly no better skin care than tallow, IF you are sourcing it well. Meet the Hearth & Homestead Store and find all my favorite skincare products there–Click here to find the best tallow balm & ancestral skincare you will find anywhere AND an exclusive savings code, just for my readers.

More thoughts on good fats

Listen in as RuthAnn and I chat all about our love for these two good fats on S7 E4 of the Simple Doesn’t Mean Easy Podcast. 

More details you dont’ want to miss in this episode:

• What hydrogenated oil is still in the recesses of RuthAnn’s kitchen? And why can’t she totally give this bad fat up?
• What does RuthAnn see as the most important reason to use good fats in her family’s meals?
• RuthAnn’s thoughts about her kids eating processed potato chips.
• If RuthAnn used tallow or vegetable oil when growing up in a Mennonite home.
• RuthAnn’s insight into how she knows when she’s “mastered” a recipe or new thing in the kitchen.
• Why RuthAnn never goes cold turkey with the family when switching out ingredients for healthier options.

What are the good fats to eat?

The best fats to include in your family’s diet are the real fats, from animals. And any fats that are natural and not hydrogenated.

Good fats include:

Lard (search “lard” & use code SOULYRESTED)

Tallow (save with code SOULYRESTED)

Olive Oil

Ghee

Avacado Oil

Butter

What fats should you avoid?

Any fats that are highly processed and hydrogenated should be avoided, if possible. This includes, but isn’t limited to, vegetable oil, canola oil, margarine, and shortening.

Which is considered a good fat?

My favorite fats to use… in fact, honestly, the only fats I’ve used for a few years now, are lard and avocado oil.

I use lard much more often than avocado oil. Typically I only find I need that for drizzling over things, such as my air-popped popcorn (before adding popcorn salt and popcorn flavorings) and my garlic-pepper Brussels sprouts.

I chat with the Chief Experience Officer of Azure Standard about good fat options, and much more, in this podcast episode: 3 Ingredients You Should Rethink (S5 E18)

How much good fat can you eat?

Overall, foods that are considered good fats (NOT hydrogenated ones) should make up about 1/3 of our diet. In general, the other 2/3 should be from protein sources and carbohydrates. Fats, proteins, and carbohydrates are the 3 macronutrients that our body needs.

What happens if you eat too much good fat?

While good fat is essential for our body, it is certainly possible to eat too much of even a good thing. Consuming too much healthy fat will result in weight gain.

What are 10 good fats?

These 10 choices are all sources of good fats:

Fish, avacado, nuts and seeds, ground flaxseed, eggs, olive oil, and beans, lard, and tallow.

Ingredients I Love Using–including Good Fats

While tallow isn’t on my own pantry list, it’s a great fat to have and use. Go here to purchase great tallow at the best price I’ve found.

Pssst… Want in on my real food secret? I get all the best ingredients & healthy snacks by doing my monthly food shopping with Azure Standard. Their quality and prices can’t be beat, I haven’t found quality wheat berries anywhere else anywhere near their prices, and we love to get staples there that I can’t even find at the local grocery store. See if they deliver near you. 

And take 10% off your entire first order with Azure (of $50 or more) with code SOULYRESTED10

More on Good Fats

The post Are Lard and Tallow Good Fat? first appeared on Souly Rested.

The first year we brought pigs home to our little New England farm, I had no idea of the joy their amazing variety of fat would bring me. I was, afterall, just in in for the bacon. But trust me, I’ve come to learn that one of my favorite parts of being a pig farmer is the fat, y’all.

If you think I’m crazy, read on. This article breaks down the many versatile uses of the three types of pork lard, and it might just make you a believer in good, amazing, glorious pig fat.

If you still need even more reasons, see 11 Reasons to Use Lard in Cooking & Baking.

If you want to know why I insist on using this amazingly good-for-you fat, and exactly how I use each kind, read “How to Bake with Lard (& why you should).”

Listen in or join us (on youtube) as RuthAnn Zimmerman and I talk about the amazingness of good fat in this podcast episode: Good Fats, with Ruthann Zimmerman

A Complete Guide to Pork Lard

There are 3 varieties of lard sourced from a pig. They’re all wonderful and I tend to use them each in different ways. Two of them are rendered exactly the same way, which we’ll dive deep into in our next article (click here for the Complete Guide to Rendering Lard). The other one doesn’t need any rendering at all, just a little rinsing and proper storage, read on for more about that.

The 3 Types of Pork Lard

1. Back fat (this is the most common and there is the most of this fat on any one pig)
2. Leaf fat (this is the pure white, coveted fat, once it is rendered)
3. Caul fat (also known as the lace fat, this is the one that simply needs to be rinsed, dried, and properly stored)

Back Fat

This is the think strip of fat that lies just under the skin and covers a pig’s back. The thickest, best portion of this lies above the pork loin, but it extends to over the shoulder (or Boston Butt) area of the pig as well. Often a butcher will provide this fat as a large slab, with the skin still attached.

If you have a helpful butcher, ask if he’d be willing to remove the skin and chop (or even grind) the fat up before giving it to you. If shouldn’t take him long but this will save you quite a lot of effort.

If you do need to remove the skin and/or cut it up yourself, I recommend doing this when it is partially frozen. I’ve never attempted it with warm, room temperature fat, but I can’t imagine it would be much fun.

HOW I USE IT: This fat, when rendered properly (click here for the Complete Guide to Rendering Lard) will have almost zero pork taste, but it will never be as pure (or as gloriously–almost blinding–white) as leaf fat. So if I have plenty of leaf fat, I seldom use the back fat for baking. But I definitely do, and it’s definitely wonderful.

Instead, this is the fat I often cook with. I keep a jar of it by the stove and use it to cook in my cast iron daily. It’s also the lard I go for when I want to deep fry some fries or some yeast donuts.

SIDE NOTE: Most of the summer I find it’s fine to leave my lard where it sits the other 3 season of the year. But occationally, during a heat wave, I will have to move my lard jar to the fridge or it liquifies. If you live in a warmer climate than New England, you may have to store your lard in the fridge during the warmer times of the year.

RENDERING IT: See the Complete Guide to Rendering Lard here. Both back fat and leaf fat are rendered exactly the same way, but I do store each differently. (I cover that in the rendering article.)

Leaf Fat

The leaf fat is the portion of fat that lies primarily around the pig’s kidneys, but some is sourced from around the pork belly as well (aka the bacon). This looks more lumpy, not a single long thick strip, like the back fat.

It will often still have a thin layer of membrane on one side. This is the membrane that separated the layer of fat from the organs in the pig. It’s often quite easy to pull off before rendering, but if you miss some, no biggie, it will just wind up floating with your cracklins and can be removed later. (More about cracklins in a bit.)

HOW I USE IT: The leaf fat is purer, cleaner, whiter than even the best rendered back fat. Even if the back fat has zero pig flavor (because it was rendered carefully), it will always be slightly brown tinted in color, more like the color of bacon fat (which I also collect in a jar in my fridge to use for deep frying and skillet cooking as well, for those times when I WANT the bacon flavor in my foods). So the leaf fat is the fat I reserve for baking, in place of butter in any recipe at a 1:1 ratio.

RENDERING IT: See the Complete Guide to Rendering Lard. Both back fat and leaf fat are rendered exactly the same way, but I do store each differently. I cover all the details in that article on rendering.

Caul Fat

The caul fat is my priced, treasured fat that gets stored carefully and used lovingly. If I sound a little fat-crazy to you, well, I’d venture you’ve never cooked with caul fat. It’s thin, bacon-flavored, fat lace that serves as a thin membrane surrounding the stomach in a pig. This lacy strip of fat is fabulous for searing around a pork loin roast as it cooks (watch the video about using caul fat there) or wrapping around maple sausage as a super easy casing. And it’s magical to watch it tighten around the meat as it fries and turns a beautiful golden brown while it sizzles.

HOW I USE IT: I use caul fat to wrap any meat I want to add special bacon-like flavor and added moisture to, or in place of casing for sausage. I source this right from the pig, immediately after it is butchered here on our farm, do my best to keep it out of dirt or mud, and carry it immediately through the fields and to the kitchen to rinse it. I then lay it out on old, clean sheets to dry before folding it and storing it in freezer bags in the deep freezer.

RENDERING IT: Since lace fat is just a thin membrane, there is no need to render it at all. All you need to do is clean it and store in as I describe above.

Is Pork Lard Solid at Room Temperature?

With the exception of what I explained above, and how lard will liquify during hot, humid temperatures if your kitchen isn’t air-conditioned, all 3 types of pork lard are solid at room temperature. But both back fat and leaf fat are spreadable at room temperature. In fact, lard is a great butter substitute, even when it comes to making a grilled cheese. Just cover the outer side of your two pieces of bread and go ahead and grill up a great cheesy lunch.

Hop over here to read more about How to Bake with Lard (and my favorite way to measure and store it for baking).

How do you render pork lard?

Hop over to this article for all the details on how to render pork lard.

Can I bake with lard?

One thousand times YES… you can bake with lard. I love baking with lard. Go here to find out How to Bake with Lard & why you should!

So is all lard the good stuff?

There are many options for sourcing fantastic real pork lard. But first let me tell you what NOT to do…

Don’t buy “hydrogenated lard” that you might see at your regular grocery store. Hydrogenated lard has been altered in a lab. It makes fat have a longer shelf life, which is good for the manufacturer, but it has also undergone a chemical change that makes it no longer good for you to eat. Read more about that here.

Where can you buy good lard?

1. If you live in New England and would like to purchase a whole or half a pig, I would love to chat about how our family farm can help you load your freezer next fall (with amazing pig fat as well as delicious pasture-raised meat). We keep a waiting list, and I am always happy to meet new customers and expand our plans for next year, to make sure your family enjoys high-quality meat. To message me, hop over to instagram or send an email to michelle(dot)visser(at)outlook(dot)com.
2. Find local pig farmers and ask around until you can hopefully find one who either sells lard they have rendered or maybe the raw fat, which you can then render yourself. See my Complete Guide to Rendering Lard. (Or just store away until you use it, in the case of caul fat.)
3. Go to eatwild.com and search for a pig farm near you.
4. Order online. Seriously. You can purchase this amazing fat, ready to use, and skipped to your door:

Caul fat

Lard made from back fat

Lard made from the inner, leaf fat 

The post Complete Guide to Pork Lard first appeared on Souly Rested.

But it turns out pasture-raised pork is some of the most delicious, versatile meat I have ever prepared. I’m adding new pork recipes right here all the time…. take a look.

Combine the versatility of pork with a few things I’ve recently learned about grocery store meat and, well, I’m elated to say I seldom buy any meat at a grocery store. Read on for all the reasons why…

Or listen in to this topic over on my podcast: the Simple Doesn’t Mean Easy Podcast, S3, E8

5 Reasons I Don’t Buy Meat at the Grocery Store

Every week, more than two million pigs are slaughtered for American dinner tables. That’s more than 104 million per year, guys! Needless to say, to meet this demand, a very industrial system has evolved that is nothing like a genuinely good food system should be.

Of course plenty of other animals are being raised commercially for meat as well, but since I’m a pig farmer and since I want this article to not grow too large in its scope, we’ll stick to pork, but know that many of these issues impact all of the meat you buy at your local grocery store.

Also, before we go any further, I’m guessing before you reach the end of this article you’re going to be wondering, “Well, where do I get my meat then!?”

Ahhhh, that’s something I LOVE taking about! I found this amazing platform that’s connecting concerned consumers like us to the BEST regenerative farmers in the nation and somehow they’re even doing it at the BEST prices I’ve found anywhere for high-quality meat that is raised right.

Check out 99 Counties, and be sure to use code SOULYRESTED for $30 off your first box and free shipping always on all orders over $150. Bonus: for a limited time you even get a FREE FILET every month for a year!

Local, Pasture-Raised Meat is What it Claims to be

The first big shocker when you examine the conventionally raised meat industry is the fact that you can’t trust the labels. Even if it’s labeled “product of USA” it’s probably imported.

If you’re more of a “give it to me quick” kinda person, I saved the gist of this whole article in a quick highlight on instagram right here.

The reality? Your meat probably came here in a container ship filled with frozen carcasses killed on the other side of the planet. But as long as it was altered or sliced in some way in the U.S., it can be labeled “product of the USA.” (source)

Insane, right?

If, on the other hand, you can raise your own meat or find a local pig farmer who keeps his pigs on pasture, you know exactly where you meat comes from.

Local, Pasture-Raised Meat Has Zero Sodium Phosphate

Whether we can blame Oprah or not, consumers demand lean meat. So we started breeding pigs for the leanest pork possible.

But of course making the animals leaner and shaving fat off the meat has reduced the flavor and tenderness. It’s a vicious cycle y’all.

So, a few decades ago, we started enhancing pork. (They sometimes call it “seasoned,” which sounds so much nicer doesn’t it?) They inject muscle groups with water, salt, and sodium phosphate during processing.

Bonus, it even increases shelf life. She says sarcastically. Of course, usually “increased shelf life” is never the nutritional option, and sodium phosphate is no exception…

• Sodium phosphate can disrupt how your body absorbs iron, calcium, and magnesium.
• Eating too many nitrates has been linked to a variety of cancers, including colorectal and stomach cancers.
• Sodium phosphate causes vascular damage, e.g. endothelial dysfunction and vascular calcification. (source)

But again, like my first reason for not wanting to buy grocery store meat, this isn’t obvious. In fact, stores don’t even have to let us know that sodium phosphate is included in our meat choice. They only have to label the meat with the words “water added” or “salt added.” Hmmmm….

Crazy enough, not only are you most likely eating unidentified sodium phosphate, you’re also paying more for the luxury.

10% more to be exact.

You see, the injection adds roughly 10 percent to the overall weight of your meat. And you don’t really have a choice… it’s almost impossible to find a grocery store in the US that sells any pork that is NOT enhanced. According to the author of The Gourmet Butcher’s Guide to Meat, “It is becoming quite difficult to find non-enhanced pork.”

Local, Pasture-Raised Meat Has Zero Ractopamine

As if the facts that my meat may be imported from overseas yet labeled “product of the USA” and injected with things that could cause heart failure and cancer isn’t enough, enter ractopamine, stage right…

While no pigs are fed or injected with hormones, many are fed products, in the last weeks of their life, that contain a food-additive drug known as ractopamine.

Ractopamine stimulates muscle growth and reduces fat, or essentially encourages the animal to grow larger and leaner, similar to the results of a human using a steroid.

Ractopamine is a beta agonist, but performs like steroids because it increases metabolism, which allows the conversion of food into muscle faster.

So it all comes back to Oprah and a hatred of fat in our meat.

Anything I’ve ever read about food or product additives that mimic hormones has been bad, to say the least, yet the USDA says it’s “safe.” The fact that ractopamine has been banned in more than 160 countries makes me wonder if I want to blindly trust the USDA on this one. (source)

If you do some research on how ractopamine impacts people, it’s not a pretty picture. Ractopamine speeds up our heart rate and leads to anxiety. Huh. Just what folks need these days. And similar drugs have been directly linked to cardiovascular health concerns.

I’ve read many folks arguing that there are no longer traces of the drug in the meat by the time it is eaten, but Consumer Reports investigated 240 U.S. pork products and found ractopamine residue in a large portion of the meat. (source)

Crazy enough, ractopamine also negatively affects the meat’s taste. Ummm, wasn’t this all a vicious cycle on a quest to improve the meat?

Local, Pasture-Raised Meat is Not “Conventionally Raised”

From The Gourmet Butcher’s Guide to Meat, by Cole Ward (which I highly recommend):

Denise Beaulieu, research scientist at the Prairie Swine Center in Saskatoon, Canada, described modern stall-based housing, which is the general commercial method of raising conventional pork… Sows are impregnated and placed into gestation stalls. Each is just big enough for the sow to stand up adn lie down–about 6 1/2 feet long and 2 feet wide. Floors are usually smooth concrete adn have narrow slots to allow waste to drop through. Sows are placed into the stalls when they’re bred, and since the average gestation time is 114 days, and sows are pregnant most of their lives… well, you get the picture.

Studies have shown that the mere last few hours of a pig’s life impacts the taste of the meat. Surely a life of stress and confinement can’t possible produce the best quality meat. Then on top of that, it’s just not right guys. Animals deserve our care and respect if we want to enjoy them and their meat to its best potential.

I’m very thankful that our family has the privilege to give a good life to a new batch of pigs every spring and summer and offer them a quick, stressless, humane death right here on our farm where they have roamed pastures for their entire life. Read more here about the process of processing pigs on the farm.

Local, Pasture-Raised Meat is Delicious

There’s a great little book, The Complete Book Of Butchering, Smoking, Curing, And Sausage Making. The author, a professional butcher himself, explains how the animal’s stress level at time of death (in addition to its temperature and overall health) can have a huge impact on the meat… on its texture, pH, moisture, and color.

It’s true, guys, all this commercialization of meat has led to bad ideas to try to improve the overall quality of the meat when, in the end, the best meat is found in the pure simple art of the old days… bringing a few piglets into your pasture, giving them a good life, and offering them a humane and simple death.

In return, they will provide your family with truly the most delicious meat you have ever tasted.

It’s simple, we have just made it complicated.

Talk to me!

If you have any questions, leave a comment below. And please tag me on ig if you share local-raised meat you’re enjoying @souly.rested.

Listen in to my podcast episode that discusses all of this in detail right here:

Season 3 Episode 8 (on apple podcast)

Other articles you may want to check out:

Lots of wonderful pork recipes straight from our pig farm

6 things you need to know if you want to raise pigs on pasture

The steps involved with processing pigs at home

Meet our pasture-raised pigs:

If you’d like to follow along as we were raising these pigs, check out the highlight about them on my instagram account.

And I saved a second set of ig stories on raising our second round of pigs right here.

Pin this for later!

Click on the image below to pin this post.

The post 5 Reasons I Don’t Buy Meat at the Grocery Store first appeared on Souly Rested.