And, well, apparently the world is itching to know about duck eggs, because that simple post gets lots of views every week.

I love raising ducks and I’m always up for talking about them, so let’s do it… Let’s talk all things duck eggs.

Sidenote: don’t miss the conclusion… you need ot know the 3 Reasons You Should be Eating Duck Eggs.

Do duck eggs taste different?

When compared to chicken eggs, duck eggs have a larger yolk-to-white-ratio, which results in a richer, almost creamer taste.

Eating one duck egg would almost be like adding an extra yolk to your chicken egg (or eating a double yolker!).

In my experience–especially depending on how you cook them–duck eggs also tend to have a more “rubbery” texture (think over-easy eggs) than a chicken egg would if cooked the same way.

Why are duck eggs better for cooking?

Generally I prefer using duck eggs for baking and chicken eggs for frying or scrambling. It’s not that duck eggs aren’t good for eating straight up–they are–but my family tends to prefer the softer texture of scrambled chicken eggs versus the slightly rubbery texture of scrambled duck eggs.

Pro tip: If you scramble 1 duck egg in with 3-4 chicken eggs, you get more of a variety of nutrients and you won’t even notice the different texture of the duck egg.

On the flip side, duck eggs literally enhance baked goods.

The extra large, creamy yolk lends itself incredibly well to chewier cookies, more soft and tender muffins, higher rise on enhanced breads, and richer flavor in puddings, ice cream, or pound cakes.

Overall, duck eggs are a magic secret ingredient in any and all baked goods. I promise if you made the same cookie recipe side-by-side with chicken eggs and duck eggs, the result would be better with duck eggs.

BTW, whenever I scramble or fry an egg, duck egg or otherwise, this is my favorite seasoning to add. (Code “soulyrested” for 15% off, all the time.)

Why people don’t eat duck eggs?

At the end of the day, the main reason people consume way more chicken eggs than duck eggs is simply because it’s easier to raise chicken eggs commercially. Ducks are a bit more high maintenance and need more space and resources to raise compared to chickens. So with the rise of commercial farming, chicken eggs were king and remain so today.

But that’s not necessarily to say chicken eggs are better than duck eggs, they’re just what we’re more used to now.

Do duck eggs tastes like eggs?

Many folks are afraid of what they don’t know, but are surprised to find out that duck eggs do, in fact, taste like eggs!

When compared to a chicken egg, duck eggs do have a slightly different flavor, mostly based off of their diet. The flavor could be described as lightly gamey or grassy. (Keep reading for more thoughts on this.)

If you’ve only ever eaten commercially raised chicken eggs, the flavor of farm fresh duck eggs might be slightly different than what you’re used to–but if the flavor is very strong or off-putting, chances are your duck eggs are bad or were mishandled by your farmer.

How to substitute duck eggs for chicken eggs

Two duck eggs is about equal to 3 chicken eggs. So if your recipe calls for 3 large eggs, use 2 average duck eggs instead.

When baking with duck eggs, keep in mind that duck eggs tend to be about 30% larger than the average chicken egg. Even so, you can substitute duck eggs for chicken eggs 1-for-1 with these 3 tips:

1. Cook your baked goods at a slightly higher temperature (up your oven temperature 5-10 degrees).
2. Bake them for just a minute or two more than if you used chicken eggs in the recipe.
3. Add slightly less liquid to your recipe.

What are the disadvantages of duck eggs?

My family and I love duck eggs, but there are some downsides.

1. Some folks find that duck eggs don’t agree with their stomach. Strangely, sometimes people who have no issues eating chicken eggs will find themselves with a hefty stomach ache after consuming duck eggs. This could be due to an allergy, or could simply be the richness of the larger-yolked duck egg that their stomach isn’t used to.
2. Some duck eggs can taste slightly “fishy.” This would mostly be due to either diet or mishandling of the eggs. If ducks are kept near or on a pond and eat a diet similar to wild ducks, you might find the eggs taste a bit gamey. If eggs are kept in too warm of a temperature or not handled or cleaned properly, this flavor will intensify.
3. Duck eggs can be pricier if you’re purchasing them. This will just depend on availability in your area.
4. The eggshells on duck eggs tend to be much thicker and harder to crack, with a thicker membrane inside the eggshell than chicken eggs. The reason this is a downside is simply because you’re more likely to wind up with small pieces of eggshells in your scrambled eggs. Just something to watch for and be aware of.

What are the pros and cons of duck eggs?

Cons:

1. Some people may find duck eggs more rubbery than chicken eggs and not enjoy the texture.
2. In some instances, duck eggs are much more rich than chicken eggs and could lead to an upset stomach, or the richness just might not be your favorite.
3. In some cases, people who eat chicken eggs just fine might be slightly allergic to duck eggs which could be as simple as an inconvenient upset stomach, or, in rare cases, could actually lead to a more serious allergic reaction.

Pros:

1. Due to their large size and richness, and higher calories and protein content, you need to eat less duck eggs to keep you full.
2. In some cases, people who can’t tolerate chicken eggs may be able to eat duck eggs with no issues.
3. Some folks prefer the slightly gamier flavor of duck eggs over chicken eggs and see duck eggs as a tasty delicacy.

Is it OK to eat duck eggs every day?

Yes, you can eat ducks eggs every day.

Keep in mind that duck eggs are a bit higher in calories compared to chicken eggs. Here’s how they compare:

• The average chicken egg= 72 calories
• The average duck egg= 130 calories

They’re also a bit higher in fat than a chicken egg. But I see this as a good thing, since most of us are lacking in the good fats.

• More here about how lard and tallow are great choices.
• And remember we need the good fats if we want all the good vitamins and minerals. (source)

Bonus: duck eggs add more protein, antioxidants, and minerals to your plate as well. Huh, that’s pretty cool, right?

So yes, go ahead and eat duck eggs every day. You deserve it.

Can duck eggs be stored at room temperature?

Fresh-laid and unwashed duck eggs can be stored at room temperature, thanks to the bloom on the outside of the shell that seals the pores of the egg.

Ideally, it’s best to eat your fresh eggs within a few weeks for the best flavor and nutrition, but they can be kept for much longer than that.

Bonus: compared to chicken eggs, duck eggs should last even longer, thanks to their thicker shells and membranes that protect the egg inside from bacteria.

One caveat to storing duck eggs is that–even more so than chicken eggs–duck eggs tend to get dirty right after they’re laid. This is because ducks stay on the ground to lay their eggs, whereas chickens often jump up higher into a nesting box to lay their eggs, get the job done, then jump back down and resume their life.

Our ducks tend to lay their eggs before we let them out of their duck house every morning, then proceed to walk over them, and often do their business right next to or on them, which means the duck’s eggs are always dirtier than our chicken’s eggs.

Pro tip: When the eggs are unusually dirty, I will wash them right after bringing them into the house and then store them in the fridge. The ones that are relatively clean because they somehow escaped the duck’s carelessness get stored on the counter and washed before they’re used.

3 reasons you should be eating duck eggs

In the end, yes, there are pros and cons, and yes there are disadvantages of duck eggs compared to chicken eggs, but I whole-heartedly believe we all should be eating duck eggs, if we can. It comes down to 3 reasons:

1. Duck eggs are a magic secret ingredient in any and all baked goods.
2. The pros outweigh the cons.
3. They offer more good stuff to your diet that chicken eggs simply don’t have.

Details about Duck Eggs and other such things:

• Everything you need to know about duck eggs (part 1)
• Would I rather raise chickens or ducks?
• Training my dog to like my birds in 5 simple steps
• A huge mistake I made when incubating chicks
• Make lasagna noodles with fresh flour (great made with duck eggs!)

And be sure to Download my FREE Pantry Checklist and all the discounts on the best ingredients

Win a Grain Mill!

Enter to win a Classic Grain Mill & free access to Fresh Flour University!

Talk to me about Duck Eggs…

If you have questions, leave a comment below. And please tag me on ig to show me your duck egg delicacies @souly.rested.

“Whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.” 1 Cor. 10:31

The post Duck Eggs : why you need them in your kitchen first appeared on Souly Rested.

We’re going to answer all of this and dive into lots more details too, right here.

In fact, think of this article as your Ultimate Guide to Sprouts.

It all started as a podcast episode–an in-depth conversation with Doug Evans, author of the bestselling book The Sprout Book–-on the Simple Doesn’t Mean Easy podcast. (S 7 E2) We chatted all about the incredible benefits of eating sprouts. And that blossomed into this resource you’re reading now.

But be sure to listen in to the episode for even more information than you’ll find here.

In this podcast episode (S7 E2), Doug shares:

• how he uses garbanzo beans to make a knock-off popcorn-ish snack.
• what sprouts he would feed to dogs (literally, not figuratively)
• the best sprout combo to use on tossed salads,
• the best blend-able sprouts to toss in a smoothie,
• his personal favorite sprout of all.

Growing your own sprouts is easy, affordable, and one simple change that can transform your nutrition. So let’s ask–and answer–all the important questions.

How can you grow veggies in the winter?

Sprouts are versatile enough that you can truly grow them in any season, in any climate. No joke.

Because you’re growing them indoors, in your kitchen, and they’re ready to eat in just 4-5 days, these are truly veggies anyone can grow, no matter where they live.

Doug Evans explains in his bestselling book, The Sprout Book, that he moved to the desert where he had no access to fresh produce, so he started growing all his food, in the form of sprouts. We talked about this and a lot more in this podcast episode (S7 E2) on the Simple Doesn’t Mean Easy podcast:

What are sprouts?

Sprouts are seeds that are rinsed and soaked to remove the testa (or seed coat), then left in the dark to sprout and grow, searching for light.

Are sprouts good for you?

Sprouts pack huge nutrition in the form of antioxidants, vitamin C, and fiber. Many medical experts agree, sprouts provide health benefits.

By soaking them, we activate the dormant seed and they germinate and sprout. As they’re sprouting, in only 4-5 days, those seeds are doubling in antioxidants, tripling in vitamin c, and quadrupling the soluble and insoluble fibers.

The sprouting process unlocks natural plant compounds that have anti-cancer and blood sugar regulating effects.

Sprouts and weight loss?

Which sprouts are the best?

Before naming what may be truly the best, most nutritious sprout, let me explain a few things.

First of all, insects are a plant’s main predators. The plants’ defense against their predators? With any vulnerability, such as a bite from an insect, a plant forms a compound (sulforaphane) that is toxic to insects.

But this same compound that protects the plants also greatly benefits us, acting as an anti-inflammatory, killing cancer cells, and improving brain health.

Broccoli sprouts contain the highest levels of sulforaphane. Broccoli sprouts contain 100-400 times the content of sulforaphane compared to other cruciferous vegetables!

So if I was going to eat only one sprout, I think broccoli would be it.

Which sprouts are cruciferous?

Cruciferous sprouts are higher in sulforaphane. These include broccoli, radish, kale, mustards, radishes, and wasabi.

What type of broccoli is highest in sulforaphane?

While broccoli is the sprout highest in the sulforaphane compound, science studied if any particular strands of broccoli have more sulforaphone than others. It turned out scientists learned that the type of broccoli doesn’t matter, but the stage the broccoli is at in its growth.

Broccoli seeds have the most sulforaphane, but other compounds in the seed make it non-bioavailable to us if we try to eat broccoli seeds. BUT if we soak the broccoli seed, removing the testa, the sulforaphone is now bioavailable.

So, folks, broccoli spouts are truly amazing.

Are sprouts different than microgreens?

Microgreens, unlike sprouts, need a growing medium (paper towels, coconut fiber, hemp fiber, and soil are all mediums to hold the roots).

Microgreens also require more water and a longer time to grow than sprouts.

Also, with a sprout you are consuming all of the plant. With microgreens we only eat the top part, cutting them off at the ground level.

Why grow microgreens?

Is sprouts offer more nutritional value and grow easier and faster, why eat micro greens?

Certain varieties of micro greens (pea shoots and sunflower seeds, for example) are much easier to grow as a microgreen. If you try to sprout sunflowers, for example, the shell is tough and you’d have remove every shell, one by one, by hand.

Also, growing the microgreen for longer means the final product tastes more like the full-grown plants.

Why don’t all grocery stores carry fresh sprouts?

Sprouts need to be transported with water, which can be tricky, and sprouts have a rather short shelf life. Both of these facts are pretty big deterrents to any large-scale business model selling sprouts.

Are there special things you need to grow sprouts?

Growing sprouts is so simple, and the tools you need are pretty minimal: Doug’s book, mason jars & sprouting lids like these & trays to drain water OR a sprout garden.

I personally love my sprout garden. It keeps everything in one compact area and keeps my sprouts well drained. For a limited time, use code TLMGIFTS15 and save 15%! Spend over $75 and shipping is free. (p.s. use that code on anything on sale on the Gift Giving List and stack your savings!)

What are the best ways to eat sprouts?

Here are lots of creative ways to eat more sprouts:

1. Add to your tossed salads
2. Blend into all of your smoothies
3. Add to stir-fry
4. Use instead of celery in tuna salad & add onto a chicken salad 
5. Add fine sprouts (like alfalfa) as a topping to your next bowl of soup
6. Stir mung bean or lentil sprouts directly into your soup, right before serving
7. Add alfalfa or clover sprouts to potato cakes (my family’s favorite way to reheat leftover mashed potatoes)
8. Add in to scrambled eggs, right before they’re ready to be removed from the skillet
9. Sprinkle on top of over-easy eggs
10. Use in coleslaw and/or potato salad
11. Add into rice dishes
12. Mix into spaghetti sauce, right before serving
13. Use as an edible garnish
14. Just pop them in your mouth, raw, as a so-good-for-you snack

The “rules” of sprouts

1. Be sure to rinse 2-3 times a day, every day.
2. Keep your sprouts moist, but not wet.
3. Try to keep them at a stable room temperature, when possible, of around 72°F.
4. Give your sprouts plenty of room to breathe, not putting too many in one jar or tray.
5. Keep sprouts covered and away from light.

Listen in as Doug and I talk through all of the points here, in this Ultimate Guide to Sprouting, and as we cover so much more, such as:

How to keep sprouts moist but not too wet.

Why it’s important to not overfill your sprout containers.

Why you should NOT use garden seeds for sprouting.

Why you might not want to buy sprout seeds in bulk.

How long sprouts can be refrigerated for.

Sponsors for this podcast episode on growing sprouts:

Please check out these two amazing family-run companies who have invested into the podcast and who are small businesses I truly believe in:

Find out more about an amazing source for sprouting tools and seeds (especially unique blends!), True Leaf Market, here: SoulyRested.com/seeds

Find out more about Azure Standard, an independent food supply chain that is fixing a broken systems and providing high-quality food and other products to families across the United States, here: SoulyRested.com/azure

Use code soulyrested10 for 10% off your first Azure order of $50 or more, delivered to a drop near you. Go here to find your nearest drop location.

Win a Grain Mill!

Enter to win a black Harvest Grain Mill & free access to Fresh Flour University!

You are welcome to enter DAILY for more chances to win, just sign up here for a daily email reminder.

Related Links mentioned in podcast:

• Dive into my FREE ecourse about sprouts right here.
• Listen in to my talk with the wholistic nutritionist who recommended our diet should be 50% veggies.
• How and why to grow sprouts (a detailed article)
• Download my complete (FREE!) 8-page Pantry Checklist for links to all my favorite sprouts as well as all the other items in my kitchen pantry (and lots of discount codes too!)

Find Doug Evans:

Sprout Whiz on TicToc

Doug Evans on instagram

Sign up for Doug’s newsletter: thesproutbook.com

Dive into his new sprouting course: OneCommune.com/sprouts

And grab Doug’s best-selling book here: The Sprout Book

Podcast Feedback

While this article briefly mentions a lot of the points of my recent chat with salt expert, Darryl Bosshardt, join in our conversation and dive into the fascinating world of salt even more right here: The Ultimate Guide to Salt & 3 questions you need to ask (S7 E1)

Or listen right here:

Did you enjoy listening to this episode? Please take a quick second to leave a review to let us know. This will help others learn about this podcast. Plus, I genuinely appreciate the feedback!

LEAVE A REVIEW HERE

Just click on “Listen on Apple Podcasts,” then scroll down under “Ratings & Reviews” and click “Write a Review.”

If you don’t have an iphone, you will need to be on a desktop to see the “Listen on Apple Podcasts” option.

 “Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good, and you will delight in the richest of fare.” Isaiah 55:2

Pin this for later!

Click on the image below to pin this post.

Find out why SoulyRested was considered to be one of the One of the Top Homesteading Blogs.

Glance at my Resource Page if you’d like to get a glimpse of all the supplies I use and recommend for everything from gardening, to homeschooling, to chicken care, to nature journaling, to maple syrup making.

The post How to Grow Sprouts, with Doug Evans first appeared on Souly Rested.

This episode of the Simple Doesn’t Mean Easy podcast focuses on Doing Things Scared… if we should, what it looks like, and some genuine results that I’ve seen along the way in my effort to make myself do things scared.

I share stories from my own life about starting projects like gardening, raising chickens, making maple syrup, and more, even when I didn’t feel fully prepared or knowledgeable.

I want to encourage you to not overprepare or overthink things, but to just dive in and learn as you go, even if it means making some mistakes along the way.

Will taking small steps and gradually gaining experience along the way eventually lead to achieving your dreams? Let’s chat about this and more in this episode.

Oh, and I start and end with two very different stories. Make sure you catch the final story at the end. It’s one I will never forget and I think it will help drive home this idea for you of doing it scared…

Where to Listen or Watch

Listen on Apple Podcasts here: Doing it Scared, Season 6 Episode 2 of the Simple Doesn’t Mean Easy Podcast

Or listen here:

And watch here:

This Episode Sponsored by:

True Leaf Market has the best fermenting kit I’ve ever used. It’s a game changer, and for a very limited time you can save $10 off of a $50 purchase (and bonus: free shipping if you’re spending $75).  Just use code SR10.

True Leaf has a lot of items I rely on often. Go here for the full list... https://soulyrested.com/seeds/

Other Articles & Resources You Might Enjoy:

8 (MORE) things you can make better yourself (podcast S4, E10)

My 8-page Pantry Checklist(free download)

[He] is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us. Eph. 3:20

I’d love to connect!

To find me in some other neck of the woods, just click any (or every!) icon below:

The post Doing it Scared (S6 E2) first appeared on Souly Rested.

First of all I spent many weeks researching this, even talking to the owner of a raw dog food company. (Catch the fun conversation on Episode 7 of Season 3 on my podcast: Simple Doesn’t Mean Easy.) 

Are dehydrated chicken feet good for dogs?

I learned that chicken feet are high in glucosamine, which I had been buying for him in pill form for years to help with his hip pain. As I’m working at incorporating more real food, and not as worried about convenience, with my own diet, I was intrigued that I could treat Bixby daily with something he would long for, and look forward to, and also feed him real, whole food instead of making him take a pill.

Are dehydrated chicken feet safe?

Even after the days of dehydrating (yes, warning, it’s not fast), and being assured by experts that chicken feet would be really GOOD for Bixby, I was kinda terrified giving him his first one. I watched every one of his happy crunches and bites closely, worried he would choke.

I quickly learned my fears were unfounded. He not only did GREAT with his first chicken foot, they immediately became his favorite treat ever, still today, years later.

In the beginning, I did cut off all the toenails before dehydrating the feet, using my gardening sheers. Some folks say this is imperative but Bixby has been eating the feet with the nails ever since that first batch, with no problem. But if your dog is small, not-so-healthy, or you’re just not so sure (as I wasn’t), feel free to remove the nails. It only takes a minute if you have good sheers.

How long does it take to dehydrate chicken feet in a dehydrator?

It takes about 48 hours for chicken feet to be “done” in the dehydrator.

I did defrost bags of frozen feet, from our last meat bird dispatch, to make my first batch, and they may have been slightly frozen still which would have added to the time of course.

You’ll know your feet are “done” and ready for storage when they have no flexibility or juiciness in the padded parts and the skin. They will be very hard and dry. Once they’re all dry, take the chicken feet out of your dehydrator and let them cool completely.

At what temperature do you dehydrate chicken feet?

You want to dehydrate your chicken feet at 150 F for roughly 48 hrs. I can fit 2 dozen feet in my dehydrator,  using only every other tray, since the feet are so thick.

How long do dehydrated chicken feet last?

1. I love these chicken feet from my favorite raw food company who also offer many other amazing functional treats.
2. And these chicken feet are great. I will often toss on an extra bag of feet when I’m ordering Bixby’s dog food from here, so I reach the free-shipping level.

How to Dehydrate Chicken Feet

1. Wash feet
2. Clip nails (or remove them all together) with garden sheers, if you prefer. (optional)
3. Line dehydrator trays with feet.
4. Run dehydrator at 150 degrees for roughly 48 hours.
5. Remove feet when they are hard and dry and there is no flexibility or juiciness in the padded parts or the skin.
6. Let feet thoroughly cool well/air dry.
7. Store in glass jars with sealed lids or mylar bags or storage buckets.

More of Bixby’s Favorites

More Details About Pets on the Homestead:

Training your dog to be chicken friendly

When your dog gets sprayed by a skunk 

Lies the pet food industry is feeding us (podcast)

5 things you need to know about raising barn kittens

Dog training & great dog products

Who teaches us more than he teaches the beasts of the earth and makes us wiser than the birds in the sky? Job 35:11

Pin this for later!

Click on the image below to pin this post.

Find out why SoulyRested was considered to be one of the One of the Top Homesteading Blogs.

Glance at my Resource Page if you’d like to get a glimpse of all the supplies I use and recommend for everything from gardening, to homeschooling, to chicken care, to nature journaling, to maple syrup making.

I’d love to connect!

To find me in some other neck of the woods, just click any (or every!) icon below:

The post How to dehydrate chicken feet first appeared on Souly Rested.

In today’s podcast episode I’m chatting with Jill Winger about all things old-fashioned foods. We cover:

• Has reducing “bad” fats & carbs from our diets made us healthier?
• If real food is life giving and good, why are we told to avoid it?
• Why has our society shifted from the way our grandparents ate?
• Particular foods we’re told to avoid that the Winger family eats a lot of (& why)
• Who is to blame for our obsession with processed food over real food?

Listen in to the podcast episode on this topic (S5 E6) over on Apple Podcasts right hereor click below:

Join Jill & Michelle on YouTube for their conversation on this topic:

Related Resources

To grow the best, most nutritious food, you need the best quality soil. This is my secret weapon: This Soil Test Kit. Use code SOULYRESTED to save 15% off! And snag a couple so you can retest next season and know if other amendments are needed. Bonus: shipping will be free if you order a couple.

The story behind my poor soil and how one test kept me from killing my garden.

My articles and recipes for Cooking Your Way Through the Pig

Links we refer to as we ask “Are Old-Fashioned Foods Healthy?”

The Forbes article that suggests a maximum of 4 egg yolks a week.

The Old-Fashioned on Purpose podcast episode we mention about the nutritional choice of using animal fats: Season 8: Episode 10: Magical Animal Fats

Where to find Jill Winger?

Her book: Preorder Old-Fashioned on Purpose here

Her podcast: https://www.theprairiehomestead.com/old-fashioned-on-purpose-podcast

Her instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jill.winger/

Her blog: https://www.theprairiehomestead.com/

Resources for folks wondering if  old-fashioned foods are healthy

My Complete Guide to Rendering Lard (an article about the healthy fat)

How to Use a Calendar to Improve your Health (podcast)

Tips for Improving Your Health, at any age (podcast)

My 7-page Pantry Checklist (free download)

Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. John 6:27

I’d love to connect!

To find me in some other neck of the woods, just click any (or every!) icon below:

The post Are Old Fashioned Foods Healthy? with Jill Winger (S5 E6) first appeared on Souly Rested.

Truth is, without a soil test, I would have killed my garden & never understood why.

Until now, I never thought a soil test was important.

I also never thought you could have too much phosphorous, since it is, after all, one of the 3 necessary nutrients for your garden.

And I never thought a garden could have too much manure or compost added in, because both are so good for a garden… or so I thought.

Boy was I wrong. On all accounts. Read on to find out how I almost killed my garden by doing all the “right” things and NOT doing the one thing I should have.

Is Soil Testing Important for your Garden?

For so many reasons, soil testing every so often is very important for you garden. Keep reading for the full scoop.

What nutrients does a soil test look for?

To be it’s best, garden soil needs these major, and minor, components:

• Nitrogen
• Phosphorus
• Potassium
• manganese
• zinc
• copper
• iron
• baron
• sulfur
• magnesium
• sodium
• molybdenum
• calcium
• chlorine
• silicon
• oxygen
• carbon
• hydrogen

The first 3 are the big 3 macronutrients that you always hear about. They’re the big 3 that make up fertilizers, in various degrees. The fertilizer numbers tell you the amount of these 3 macronutrients, so a fertilizer labeled with “23-3-8” will contain 23% Nitrogen, 3% Phosphorus, and 8% Potassium.

You can also purchase micronutrient fertilizers, but more on that in a minute.

Why do these nutrients matter in your garden soil?

The healthier your garden soil is, with the ideal balance of all the macro and micronutrients, the healthier your soil bacteria will be.

Why does bacteria matter in your soil? It’s kind of the same idea as the importance of healthy bacteria in your gut, actually. (Y’all know I take that topic very seriously, and solve it deliciously, by making my own kombucha.)

When the good bacteria is healthy, they form new soil constantly and your soil is continually fertile. Those good little guys also create growth regulators in your soil, which the plants need in order to take in nutrients. (source)

Can you really have too much of a good nutrient in your garden soil?

Okay, so if these nutrients are all vital in good bacteria development and the overall soil health, surely you can’t have too many nutrients, right?

That’s honestly what I always thought. I knew that compost and manure were great at building up soil nutrients. And I knew that 10-10-10 fertilizer packed a nice dose of all 3 important nutrients into the soil.

So I always made sure to add the major nutrients at every opportunity. I would do all of these things:

• I always dug deep below each new seedling or seed before planting it to bury some 10-10-10 to feed the roots as each plant grew.
• Then I would scatter some 10-10-10 around the top of the ground near all newly planted things in my garden soil.
• In the same areas where I added fertilizer I sprinkled rich, black compost as well. Compost I tended to myself all year long and knew it was good stuff.
• Every fall I would allow the chickens and ducks free-ranging access to the garden area, after I had harvest all our food. They could turn over the soil, dig out roots, and leave their poo all over for added wonderful manure.

While there’s nothing wrong with any of these techniques, without first testing your soil, to analyze your current nutrients, every one of these things could do more harm than good.

Why I did a soil test…

Last year’s garden baffled me a little.

We had a lot of rain. A LOT. And my plants were all looking bad. Their leaves all had signs of fungus, so I removed any bad looking leaves, made sure no plants had leaves toughing the ground, removed all bad leaves far from the garden (and made sure to never add them to my compost pile… go here for more on how to make compost), and treated the plants with a natural fungicide.

But nothing helped.

I was very thankful I had early crops of everything because the garden quickly dried up and I had little to harvest by end of August. More leaves continually kept looking yellow, even after a month of doing all the right things to combat fungus.

So I ordered a soil kit.

Because I’ve had great respect for Redmonds for years (I’ve used no other salt since I met them) I knew I wanted to try their new soil test kits. I talked with their company and knew they were not only affordable but would provide all the details I needed to analyze my garden soil (in layman’s terms), and correct any deficiencies.

It was super easy to collect my dirt sample and mail it back in the postage paid envelope that was included in the kit. The wait, on the other hand, was pretty hard. Thankfully, in exactly 5 days from when placed the kit in my mail box (even including 3 days over a holiday weekend!) I had an email with a link to my results.

I knew a soil test like this one that I requested doesn’t test for soil disease, fungus, or pest problems. But I also knew that healthy soil is always much less susceptible to disease and pests than unhealthy soil, so it seemed logical to start by seeing if indeed my soil was healthy.

It turned out it was the perfect place for me to start.

If you’re interested in a soil test kit of your own, use code SOULYRESTED and save 15% off your entire order (feel free to order multiple kits and take 15% off the full amount).

Join me, live, in my gardens as I gather soil to do a soil test:

What I learned from a soil test of my garden soil…

I was surprised at how shocked I was with the results. I truly thought I surely had fantastic soil. It looked wonderful. I did all the “right” things. And until that dreaded excessive rain and fungus I’d never had a problem.

I was also surprised that I felt like a dejected middle schooler with an embarrassing report card as I opened that email of test results a few days after sending in my soil.

I had an insanely high amount of Phosphorus. And an almost non-existent amount of both Nitrogen and Potassium.

While a surplus of any nutrient may not seem like an issue, high phosphorus levels can actually do some excessive damage to garden plants.

What does excess phosphorus do to garden soil?

Too much phosphorus in the soil can destroy otherwise healthy plants.

I was shocked the more research I did… It turns out that plants growing in excessive amounts of phosphorus develop yellow leaves. Guys, I never had a fungus! I had excessive phosphorus, but to combat what I thought was fungus I kept adding all the “good nutrients” to the soil… I added more compost than usual. More 10-10-10 than usual. And I let the chickens and ducks spend even more long weeks in the garden last fall and even in winter…

All of these things added MORE phosphorus to the soil and exasperated my problem.

Then this spring my poor new seedlings were going into bad soil and I made it worse by planting them with excess compost and fertilizer.

I should have done the soil test last fall, instead of after planting the garden this spring.

You see, when there is high amounts of phosphorus, it impacts plant roots to the point that they are not able to take in zinc and iron from the soil, even if there is plenty of these micronutrients in the garden soil.

My results showed a low amount of iron, but crazy high amounts of zinc, in fact as high as the phosphorus.

But my plants were suffering from a lack of zinc because they weren’t able to get the zinc through their roots.

When the plant isn’t getting these micronutrients, the leaves will turn yellow and wither.

At this point I was really thankful that the soil test I chose to use made the rest super easy for me.

So what do you do if a soil test reveals excess phosphorus?

Unlike other soil tests I’ve heard of, my results covered both ends of the spectrum. I liked that I had a quick glance, with a simple bar chart, but also the nitty gritty details:

But what I really loved was that they didn’t do. They didn’t leave me hanging, telling me a bunch of information but no solution. Funny enough before I even realized this I was googling what to do about high phosphorus levels in garden soil.

I was reading things like,”While commercial growers may be able to treat zinc and iron deficient plants through foliar feeding, this option is often not realistic for home growers.” What?

I read lots about how phosphorus harms the roots and how specifically zine and iron will not be able to enter the roots and the plant will yellow and wither from deficiencies. I read about what causes the high phosphorus levels, and I read about long-term ways to correct the problem. But I was left defeatedly feeling there wasn’t much I could do to help my poor just-planted garden.

Then (silly me) I finally read the rest of my test result information. (Don’t be me. Trust me, read it all before you panic.)

With handy links, my test results told me two products that I could apply immediately that may save my plants.

Other Problems of Excess Phosphorous in Soil?

What I’m doing immediately

• No more compost goes in the garden. At all.
• No more 10-10-10 (Avoiding the addition of phosphorus for several growing seasons will help reduce the amount present in the soil.)
• Ordered foliar spray of iron and zinc
• Ordered 5-0-5 fertilizer

What I’m doing as soon as I can

• Spreading, working into the soil, and watering well 5-0-5 fertilizer over every inch of the garden (avoiding getting it directly on any of the plants)
• Mulching with straw and/or grass clippings to encourage the fertilizer to stay in place, and not run off with watering or rainfall
• Treating all the plants’ leaves with the foliar spray weekly (or at least once a month) *
• Adding a lot of coffee grounds to my compost pile, which will add a lot of nitrogen to my garden soil next year. (To increase our usual amount, I’m going to try to find a local coffee shop that will save their grids for me for a few days, hoping they’ll want to help a local gardener amend her soil.)
• Researching a good cover crop that will amend this soil problem. **

What I won’t be doing in the upcoming years

• Adding compost to the garden, unless I’ve built up sufficient nitrogen and less phosphorus (a soil test will tell me next year)
• Adding manure to the garden
• Allowing the chickens and ducks to forage in the garden in the fall
• Using 10-10-10 fertilizer again, at least until I get back positive soil test results in future years
• Retesting my soil at least once a year, maybe twice (spring and fall). Since code SOULYRESTED saves 15% off my entire order, for a limited time, I may stock up on these soil test kits!

More About Cover Crops

To fix high phosphorous levels, try planting a winter cover crop of legumes, such as clover or winter peas. (source) In the spring, you can simply till under the plants into your garden beds. As these plants decompose, they will raise the total nitrogen in the soil and will make nitrogen available for plants that are unable to get nitrogen from the air. Your garden will grow greener and more lush thanks to plants that fix nitrogen and their beneficial symbiotic relationship with bacteria.

Nitrogen fixing plants don’t pull nitrogen from the air on their own. They actually need help from a common bacteria called Rhizobium. The bacteria infects legume plants such as peas and beans and uses the plant to help it draw nitrogen from the air. The bacteria converts this nitrogen gas and stores it in the roots of the plant. When the plant stores the nitrogen in the roots, it produces a lump on the root called a nitrogen nodule (You can bet I’ll be looking for nitrogen nodules next fall!) This is harmless to the plant but very beneficial to your garden.

A Few of my Favorite Gardening Things

Talk to me about soil testing in a backyard garden…

If you have any questions, leave a comment below. And please tag me on ig to show me your amazing gardens @souly.rested.

More Helpful Gardening Articles:

How to Grow Seedlings for Profit

7 Tips for Container Planting

8 Gardening Tricks Inspired by the Pros

All the Best Gardening Tools and Resources

Let us acknowledge the LORD; let us press on to acknowledge Him. As surely as the sun rises, He will appear; He will come to us like the winter rains, like the spring rains that water the earth. Hosea 6:3

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So I thought I’d document what I did, what I earned, and if it was worth it.

Deciding What to Grow From Seed

Tomatoes were wildly popular with my customer base, here in New England. While I will probably expand to more offerings next year, I will weigh heavy on the side of unique, heirloom, organic tomatoes.

But of course you could poll your audience and see what folks seem to be most interested in growing in their gardens next year and what they’d like to buy.

Creating Interest Before You Even Plant

It’s a great idea to start a “wait list” to create demand and so when the perfect week rolls around in the spring–when your plants are at their prime and planting season is upon you–you already have an eager list of customers.

If you do keep a wait list, I highly recommend sending them updates every few weeks once you plant your seeds to get them excited and to make sure they haven’t forgotten about you and wind up going to a nursery to buy their wish list.

When it’s Time to Plant

I’m still new to this idea of growing seedlings to sell for profit, so I am careful to only plant varieties that I myself truly want. If I wind up with an excess I can most likely put them to good use. But I have some other tips too:

1. Plant what you want for yourself (nothing goes to waste).
2. Plant what you know. It helps to sell the plants if you know what you’re talking about. So many potential customers said things like “I want a tomato that’s really big and great for sandwiches.” Or “I want a cherry tomato that’s average size… not too small, not too big.” I had to know the details about my seedlings if I wanted to recommend the right plant for them. And because i was confident with what they’d like, they often bought extra.
3. Label everything. Even if you color code everything and think you’ll remember what is what, trust me. You won’t. So label well. I’d also recommend avoiding your own shorthand, realizing the customer will want the full name of the plant on each container.
4. Plant in containers you don’t want back. This might seem silly, but I was scrambling for enough containers when my seedlings took off and needed to be up-potted and I regretted that I planted some, which I later sold, in containers that cost me a few dollars to buy. That cuts a good bit into your profit.
5. Use good quality soil. These plants are with you for 10 weeks, you want them to look great when it’s time to sell them, plus you want to be able to assure your customers that these are organic, high-quality plants.

What You’ll Need to Get Started

I can’t recommend a good grow light system enough. Hearty plants lead to satisfied customers. Everyone who picked up plants surveyed their box or bag and were very excited to dish out the cash to me. I’m pretty sure they will be repeat customers. But without a grow light set up my plants would have inevitably been leggy and skinny. Aside from your overall growing location, you will need:

• Great seeds. I can’t stress this enough. Great germination is key or you won’t have time to grow the full amount you had hoped to sell.
• Compost
• Potting soil
• Disposable cups with drainage holes drilled in the bottom
• Some larger disposable options as well, for the plants that need up-potting (and will bring you more money too). I use large plastic tubs, think xl sour cream, xl margarine tubs, bubble gum tubs. You can even ask on local facebook groups for these containers in the winter ahead and stockpile them.
• Sharpie for labeling as you plant
• Many strong box trays or seedling trays for transporting your cups of seeds/seedlings/plants around the growing areas and outside when it’s time to start hardening them off. Over the next 10 weeks, you will be moving these around a LOT. It’s worth the investment in some sturdy trays.

What You Need to Send Plants Home with Customers

• Start stocking up on the perfect sized cardboard boxes if you can a few weeks before it’s time to sell the plants. Aldi’s and BJs is a perfect spot, and I keep any packaging boxes that are delivered to our home too.
• Packaging tape is a great way to secure the cups of plants to the inside wall of boxes they’re being transported home in.
• Brown bags are handy for transport as well. If you cut off the top and use them as a (flimsy) tray of sorts
• Plastic shopping bags are nice to use to line the bottom of paper bags or boxes for transport, incase the plants are leaking water or dirt.
• Old newspaper is great to shove in around the cups of the plants to keep them in place in their packaging box or bag.
• Cash for change. When they pick up their plants they may not have exact change.

This Sunrise Bumblebee tomato plant was very tall and a little fragile, so I secured the cup (the orange one) to the back of a tall box with packaging tape and nestled the customer’s other two (smaller) plants in a brown lunch bag (with the top cut off) to keep them in place in front of the bumblebee. Then I filled the rest of the box with a few inches of crumpled up newspaper. Customers genuinely appreciate the little extra effort you take to help them get their plants home safely.

Things to Think About When You do Your Inventory

I can only give you my own example, from this year (my first at doing this). In fact, I didn’t mean to get into the seeding business at all. I just got really over-eager when I was planting my seeds this year and was shocked with I counted my total about a month after I had planted. I had 219 plants, but only room in my garden for about 125.

So I itemized my inventory and decided three things before listing plants for sale:

1. What plants I wanted for my own garden. (The only plants I had extra of were tomatoes. I only had enough peppers, basil, oregano, chicory, broccoli, and Brussels sprouts for myself. I guess I was just feeling extra happy when I was planting tomato seeds.)
2. What plants I might want extras of. (Something always dies once they go in the garden, so were there some plants I wanted to keep extras of?)
3. What plants I wanted to set aside to gift to my daughter or friends who may not have the means to buy plants (I helped Logan turn over her first-ever garden last week–happy day!)

How to Decide What to Charge

The best advice I can give you is to go to a high-quality nursery and see what they’re charging. If your plants look nice and healthy, most potential customers are willing to pay you slightly more than they’d spend at a nursery if you’re offering varieties of plants that are hard to find and that they know are organically grown.

It’s a difficult game to play to decide ideal planting time, but of course the bigger your plants the more you can charge. If they get too big you have the problem of having to stake them (I just use twigs I gather in the yard and twine) and up-pot them.

I decided to charge a range based on plant maturity. It’s all arbitrary, but it worked for me. I asked customers what they wanted, picked through my inventory for the ideal plants for them, pulling out the largest/most beautiful first, and quoted them a total based on plant maturity ($5 for very small, $7 for average, $9 for large). My plan was to down-size their plants if anyone bulked a little at the total, but honestly no one did. I always made sure they knew I was pulling out the most mature, healthiest plants for them and reiterated that they were heirloom (if they were) and organic.

Also, a few of my customers didn’t come through until my final “advertising” (which was just posting to a few relevant local fb groups, no real “ads” going on). At that point I had tended the plants an extra 2 weeks beyond my first sales. Factoring in my extra time spent with caring for and hardening off these plants, and the fact that they were considerably taller now, I upped my range to $7 (all small or medium size) or $14 (the largest ones).

What Your Profit Might Look Like

So, in the end, after setting aside extra plants for myself and Logan, I only had 59 plants to sell.

Yeah, not a whirlwind entrepreneurial adventure here. But still worth documenting so I can expand wisely next year, given what I learned this year. Here are my numbers:

• 59 plants
• 10 paying customers
• $401 in sales

I thought it was interesting that in the end I made almost $7 per plant, which of course was the average price. (Math is funny that way, huh?)

So after all is said and done I figure my own large garden was free this year… I imagine $401 more than covers the seeds and any other expenses I will have (staking, fertilizer, pots/containers, and straw for mulching) and in a weird way it was kinda fun… 5th grade Michelle, who loved to play “store,” came out in full force last Saturday when I had customers messaging and popping in through out the day.

EDIT to add: I had more expenses than I expected after doing a Soil Test, and finding out how badly my soil needed amending. I shared here about my soil problems in my garden.

If I want to upscale my plant-selling operation, I could pretty easily make a few thousand dollars next year. Of course I would need to invest in more growing shelves and lights, so the first year that would eat into that profit.

It was so fun, and honestly rewarding to be helping others grow their own food this year, I might give it a whirl in a future year.

The post Grow seedlings to sell for profit first appeared on Souly Rested.

How do you bake with lard?

Essentially, you can use lard in your kitchen any way you would use other fats. Instead of canola oil in your skillet, use a TB of lard. Instead of margarine in a cake, use equal amounts of lard. Instead of butter in cookies, use the equivalent of lard, or half butter half lard.

It does behave differently than other oils. That’s because with lard, the fats stay intact when they melt. With butter, on the other hand, the oil and the milk separate at higher temperatures. The oilier the food, the more likely it will be harder when it cools, so cookies made with butter will be crisper and cookies made with lard will be chewier.

You’ll also find biscuits and pie crusts and pastries made with lard are truly amazing, flaky, and so light.

Tips for baking with lard in place of butter:

• You can substitute lard for butter in a 1:1 ratio.
• You can also use 1/2 butter and 1/2 lard in any recipe, to keep some of the butter’s flavor but add in the health benefits of lard.
• Experiment with small flavor additions to recipes where you’ve swapped out butter for lard, again, since butter offers a true flavor and lard is flavorless (unless it’s poorly rendered, then it’s bacon flavored. More on proper rendering techniques here).
• My favorite example of the above tip is to add chopped mint to chocolate chip cookies. You barely taste the mint, but wow is the overall impact amazing. See my recipe for Chocolate Chip Cookies made with Lard here.
• Also consider adding a few pinches extra of salt or sugar, again, to provide more flavor in the absence of butter.
• Cookies made with butter will always run and need to be at least 2″ apart on cookies trays. Cookies made with lard will not run, so you can place your dough balls much closer together.
• If I’m using butter in recipes I will often cook the baked goods a few minutes longer than I do with lard.
• With cookies made with butter I will always let them cool completely on the warm-out-of-the-oven cookie sheets before removing them to a cooling rack. But with the same recipe substituting lard for butter I never do this, but instead remove the cookies from the hot trays right to a cooling rack. The lard solidifies into chewiness so much easier than butter and I don’t want them getting too done on the hot trays.
• I render my lard and freeze it in butter-shaped molds, so it’s super easy to use in place on butter in any recipe. (The molds even have TB marks, so you can use the lard by the TB. How cool is that?)
• If you want to make sticks of lard, with molds like mine, you can then freeze them, in freezer-safe containers, and just grab a bar or two for your next recipe.

Why bake with lard?

It’s a long sordid history of when and why animal fats went out of fashion, but it’s my firm belief that the small revival we’re seeing of folks seeing the benefit of real fat, sourced from well-raised animals instead of a chemical lab is a very good thing.

I was on the Old Fashioned on Purpose podcast recently talking about the history behind this crazy change in the way our nation views good fats. Join here that conversation right here.

But let’s break down why animal fats are good for us. Our body needs the cholesterol and saturated fats found in animal fats, like lard and tallow, for so many reasons.

Here are some of the ways lard benefits our health:

Our organs need cholesterol to function well.

Every cell in our body has cholesterol in it. We need it at a very basic level.  Cholesterol is a waxy, whitish-yellow fat and a crucial building block in cell membranes.

We need healthy fats in our diet for a healthy brain & emotions.

Our brain needs cholesterol, because we can’t create neurotransmitters without it It’s interesting to wonder if that brain fog we sometimes experience is because we haven’t had any fatty (good fat) foods recently. Numerous studies (source) have shown that a low-cholesterol diet is linked to severe depression. 

In scientific trials that studied people who ate less fats, they found an increase in suicide and violence-related death. (source)  there are many other factors at play in such things, we can’t say definitively the correlation is there, but it’s definitely worth noting.

Healthy fats, like lard, are good for us.

Who would’ve thought we’d be eating more nutritiously by eating fat? But it’s true. Lard is high is B vitamins, which play an important role in our immune response.

Lard is high in vitamin D.

Lard—well all products we can eat from pastured pigs—is one of a few food sources high in vitamin D. Because it is sourced from a pig’s back, pork lard made from back fat is very high in vitamin D. Which makes sense. The pigs spend their lifetime basking in the sun and absorbing it through their skin.

Current research shows that we should have 250 micrograms of vitamin D per day. Guess how much lard, rendered from back fat, you need to have 250 micrograms of vitamin D? One tablespoon. That’s it. Yes, lard from pastured pigs contained 1000 IU of vitamin D per tablespoon. 

Lard helps you absorb important vitamins.

Not only does lard come loaded with vitamins, but it helps us absorb vitamins as well. Vitamins A, D, E, and K, which are fat-soluble, couldn’t be absorbed by our bodies without fat in our diet.

Healthy fats, like lard, give us that feeling of being full and satisfied so we don’t over eat.

It’s so helpful that the good fats make our bodies full, because it helps us avoid the temptation of eating processed food, loaded with hydrogenated oils, which are truly the bad fats.

Eating healthy fats with your meal keeps your blood sugar from spiking. So you don’t get that crash (and feel tired) after eating.

So unlike the processed, high-sugar foods that leave you feeling like crap 10 minutes after you eat them, real food that includes real fats don’t cause a “crash.”

In the end, 30% of your calories should come from fats and they should be eaten with every meal.

Keep in mind, though, that moderation is important. Every gram of fat has nine calories. Carbohydrates and proteins have four calories per gram.

So what are the bad fats?

All processed fats, which have been made in a lab, are made with hydrogenated oils. (More below on how these oils in our diet impact our health.)

These oils start off just fine. They’re oil from plants (olives, sunflowers…). Then they go to a lab where an extra hydrogen molecules is parked on every open space in that oil. Why? Lab-produced oils have a very long shelf life and are cheaper to produce than real fats.

What foods include hydrogenated oils?

• margarines
• crisco
• most packaged foods
• many salad dressings
• baked goods at the grocery store
• ready-to-use cookie dough (maybe the worst culprit).

What’s wrong with fake fats?

The list is very long when you start investigating the evidence. When you start looking for articles in scientific journals that describe the findings and results when scientists dive into this very question of “what’s wrong with fake fats?” This list is only a little tip of a very big iceberg.

Trans fat in hydrogenated oil has been shown to:

Negatively impact fetal development (source)

Lower birth weight (source)

Increase diabetes (source)

Increase osteoporosis (source)

Reduce milk supply in breastfeeding women (source)

Lower testosterone (source)

Lower normal sperm count (source)

Increase heart disease (source)

Increase breast cancer  (source)

Increase coronary heart disease [especially from margarine use] (source)

How does lard compare to butter?

The main difference is their source. Butter is a dairy product and lard is a pork product. But both are pretty wonderful.

Their numbers are similar, whether you’re talking calories or smoke point, but here’s the main differences I have found:

• Butter has 102 calories per tablespoon. Lard has 115. 
• Lard has a little higher smoke point 370, compared to butter’s 350.  But ghee (butter with all extra moisture removed) sits at an amazing smoke point of 485.
• Pastured lard is one of the best vitamin D sources on the planet. Butter offers a little, but lard takes the cake in this category. In 1 tb of lard you have 1,000 IU of vitamin D (1 tb butter has 9 IU) . Daily recommended amount is 600-4,000.
• Fats in lard remain intact and soft after melting, but butter separates into oil and milk solids. Butter may wind up making recipes seem a bit oilier and also harder once they cool down, while lard tends to keep them soft. (Cookies are so soft and chewy and they don’t flatten out and spread when baking.)
• And, random fact, lard is more multi-purpose… you can’t use butter to make soap or candles.

Why is lard not used in baking?

Given all of its virtues, I do often wonder why lard isn’t more popular in American kitchens, but I think a lot of it comes down to ease. It’s a lot easier to grab an oil from the store than find a source for pork fat and learn how to render lard. (Here’s my Complete Guide to Rendering Lard, btw.)

And of course many just don’t KNOW the benefits of using lard. Please pin this article and share it with your friends (please tag me if you’re sharing on social media so I can share too).

Which is better in baking–lard or Crisco?

Please, if you have Crisco in your kitchen, only use it if you need to make some emergency stash of candles. It won’t burn pretty, but that is the only thing I can think of that Crisco is good for. But lard, rendered from pork fat (NOT the hydrogenated version of “lard” you might find in stores occasionally) is all-natural, good-for-you fat.

RuthAnn Zimmerman and I chatted about this very topic (and the ONE thing RuthAnn will still bake with Crisco & why) in a recent episode of the Simple Doesn’t Mean Easy podcast.

What are some other great fats to use in the kitchen?

1. Avocado Oil

2. Ghee

3. Palm Oil

Can you buy good lard?

You can absolutely source good lard, either as fat that you can render down yourself, or as already rendered lard. Here are some tips:

Items I Use When Baking With Lard:

Talk to me!

If you have any questions, leave a comment below. And please tag me on ig to show me your amazing creations baked with the good fat @souly.rested.

 

More Information about Baking with Lard:

Chocolate Chip Cookies Made With Lard

3 Types of Pork Lard — everything you need to know about each one.

The Complete Guide to Rendering Lard 

My favorite ingredients I use every day in my farmhouse kitchen

 

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“He satisfies the thirsty and fills the hungry with good things.” Psalm 107:9

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When we brought home our first pigs, I was in it just for the bacon. (Read here for the 6 Things You Need to Know if You’ll be Raising Pigs on Pasture And check out the full scoop about Processing Pigs at Home.)

After stocking our freezers that first fall, I quickly realized there were so many wonderful cuts of pork that I am a huge fan of. In fact, the pork steak and ground pork and juicy pork chops all stand above even the delicious bacon in my mind.

Oh, and the lard. I might possibly agree to raising pigs if all I got out of it was the lard, guys.

How to Render Lard

If you’re more of an auditory learner, I’ve walked you though the entire process, and shared everything you need to know about rendering lard in a recent episode on my podcast, Simple Doesn’t Mean Easy. 

Are There Different Kinds of Pork Lard?

While there are 3 varieties of lard that you can source from a pig (go here for the nitty-gritty on the 3 Types of Pork Lard), this article will just talk about two of them, the two that are processed the exact same way. I do store them and use them differently though, but more on that later.

Can You Cook with Lard?

I cook with lard daily. It doesn’t smoke at high temperatures, so it’s perfect for frying. Not to mention the fact that veggies roasted in lard come out wonderfully crisp and delicious. Usually my choice of lard for oiling my skillet is a spoonful out of the jar of lard that sits by my stove.

Can you Bake with Lard?

Lard is amazingly wonderful for baking. It inhibits the formation of gluten, making it the Holy Grail of fat if you’re trying to achieve perfection in a flaky pastry or pie crust. And it has these mammoth size fat crystals that also make it almost impossible to not nail the best biscuits.

For baking (like these amazing chocolate chip cookies made with lard) I use bars of lard out of my freezer. I explain more about how I use all 3 different types of pork lard in this article.

Okay, so what do you need to know about rendering lard?

While there are 3 types of pork lard, only 2 of them need to be rendered: back fat and leaf fat. While these two types of fat are slightly different, I follow the exact same steps to render them down to lard.

1. Remove skin (from back fat) or outer membrane (on leaf fat), unless the butcher did this for you. I find this step and the next one are easiest to do when the fat is mostly frozen, but slightly thawed. With back fat, I will make a few cuts, dividing the strip into 2-3″ long chunks, then remove each chunk from the skin. This is more manageable than trying to remove the full piece of skin in one slice.
2. Cut any larger pieces of fat into smaller chunks, maybe 2 or 3 inches long.
3. Fill a large stock pot with your chunks of fat. (My stock pot is a 12 quarts.)
4. Turn the burner on medium to medium low. (I had read that rendering needs to happen at the lowest temperature possible, so my first attempt at rendering lard i kept the burner on its lowest setting. Two hours later I had about 1 inch of liquid fat in the bottom of my pan. It should never take that long, my friends, and there’s no need for it to. Instead, I find it best to monitor the temperature of the liquid lard and keep it at a nice steady temperature of 220 the entire time.)
5. Monitor your pot by setting an alarm for every 30-40 minutes and checking it each time the alarm goes off. Stir the chunks of fat and check to see that the temperature of the liquid fat is in the 220 range every time the timer goes off.
6. When you have mainly liquid, with large and small chunks floating on top, use a large slotted spoon to scoop out the pieces of fat.
7. Carefully pour the liquid lard from your stock pot into a strainer, draped with a thin towel, resting on large bowl.
8. Carefully adjust your towel, so fresh fabric is covering the strainer, and move your strainer to another large bowl.
9. Pour strained liquid fat from the first bowl into the second, straining it a second time (after placing chunks in pan of rejects). The more effectively you strain your lard the better tasting (aka not “porky” tasting) it will be.
10. Pour the strained lard into clean, sanitized jars or molds. I use these molds and find there’s no need to grease them.
11. IF USING MOLDS: Freeze lard in molds for about 1 hr 15 minutes then pop out and store in freezer-safe container in freezer for years, taking out as needed to replace a stick of butter in baking.
12. IF USING MASON JARS: wipe rim of jar after filling with liquid lard and place canning lid on with rim, fingertip tight. Within a few hours, the liquid golden fat will turn spreadable-solid and white. The lid should be sealed and you can store your jars of lard in a cool, dark place for years.

NOTES about rendering lard:

• A thermometer like this is invaluable to help you easily monitor the temperature of the liquid and keep consistently around 220-225.
• The chunks of fat that are removed can be cooked into cracklins. I will separate the large pieces to give to our chickens or keep in the freezer as very special dog treats. And the smaller ones become delicious cracklins for my salads in the upcoming week or I use them to make cracklin bread (by substituting cracklins for bacon).
• Using a 12-quart stock pot filled with pork fat, with 3 sets of these molds, I find I need to do this step in thirds. While the first batch of 12 sticks is in the freezer, I kept remaining lard on burner, keeping at 220-ish. I find it takes 1 hr and 15 minutes for the lard sticks to fully freeze in these molds.
• Using a 12-quart stock pot filled with leaf fat yields 36 bars (9 pounds) of lard “butter” a few cups of cracklins, and a 1/2 gallon ziploc bag of cracklins (larger, that i didn’t get crispy, just cooked)
• To release lard sticks from molds, I press each section of the mold from the bottom, turning it almost inside out as the stick pops out.
• While both back fat and leaf fat render into wonderful lards, the leaf lard is considered the creme de la creme. It’s purer, never pork tasting, and a blinding white color. In the picture below you can see the yellow tint to the back fat lard vs. the stark white of the leaf lard.

But is Lard Good for you in your Daily Diet?

Yes! Lard is truly a good, healthy, natural fat, loaded with reasons to include it in your diet, but the best reason may be that it’s far superior to the alternative of hydrogenated fats found in all processed foods (or… dare I even say the words… margarine, seed oils, or shortening). More about Why You Should Bake With Lard here.

Is There Any Lard that Doesn’t Have to be Rendered?

You can purchase already-rendered lard from a local pig farmer or reputable online sources (see some below) but never waste your money on the “lard” you can find at the traditional grocery store that has been hydrogenated.

There is also one type of lard–the membrane that surrounds the pig’s stomach–that does not have to be rendered. Read more about caul fat here and check out this video as well:

All Your Questions About Rendering Lard

Can I render lard in a crock pot?

Absolutely. I prefer to closely monitor the temperature by using a stock pot on the stove. This creates the purest, whitest lard for me (for back fat as well as leaf fat). But I have used a crock pot with fine success as well. The important thing is to use a low heat and stir it pretty often.

Can I render lard in the oven?

Absolutely. I find that using a stock pot on the stove creates the purest, whitest lard for me (for back fat as well as leaf fat), but there’s no reason to not use the oven instead.

How long does it take to render lard?

There are many variables, but expect it to take most of your day. I tend to start my lard rendering in the morning and am finishing up after dark. While you need to be home and able to check in on the temperature and stir your rendering lard every 30-60 minutes, it is very easy and not time consuming.

What are the benefits of rendering lard?

I think the best benefit of rendering lard is the fact that you can bake with lard. And it’s a fantastic oil choice for cooking on the stove top, since it has such a high smoke point. It’s ideal for all of your high-heat cooking.

Will I mess up if I choose the wrong method (crock pot/oven/stove)? Or the wrong pan?

I highly doubt you will mess anything up. The important thing is to render your lard on low heat and stir it pretty often. You got this.

Is it okay that my lard is changing color in the pan?

As pork fats warm, they turn color (no they’re not burning) and start to smell a little “piggy.” You’re not doing anything wrong.

Should I render on the absolute lowest setting possible?

No. I tried this once and it took forever and a day! Instead, monitor the temperature of your liquid fat with a thermometer like this. Keep your liquid at around 220-225 degrees.

Can I take my lard off the heat and resume the rendering hours later if I need to?

Yes! It’s totally fine to pull your partially rendered lard off the stove while you go run an errand or do a farm chore you have to do. If you can cover it and keep it somewhat warm you’ll save time, since it will solidify if you let it totally cool. The photo below is a pot of lard that I did let totally cool before I reheated it and finished rendering it. (The cracklins are covering the top.)

Do the floating chunks at the end have to be tiny pieces before it’s “done”?

No, often my cracklins are 1/4-inch chunks or sometimes larger… the size of salad croutons. But sometimes I’ll process the fat in giant strips (without cutting them up) and my cracklings at the end will be giant size. It’s more productive to start with small pieces of fat, but some days you gotta choose the easier route. My point is that the size of your cracklings at the end is determined by the size of your chunks of fat that you start with.

What’s the difference in lard and tallow?

The main difference in lard and tallow? The fact that lard is sourced from pigs and tallow from cows.

But my good friend, RuthAnn Zimmerman, and I take a deep dive into this very topic right here and explore all kinds of details about both lard and tallow: Good Fats, S7 Episode 4 of the Simple Doesn’t Mean Easy podcast

And listen in to this additional episode on my podcast for more thoughts on why food changed, why we were fed so many lies (like “animal fat is bad for us”), and why we bought into the lie: Why we’ve bought into the lie (S3, Episode 2)

What’s better… lard or butter?

Both butter and lard are excellent choices of fats.

Butter may wind up making some recipes seem oilier in the end, since butter separates when you heat it, into oil and milk. This, btw, is also why you have to keep a nice distance between cookies on the tray that are made with butter. Lard, on the other hand, remains intact when melted. So cookies made with lard don’t flatten and meld into one another on the hot tray.

Butter will also be slightly harder once it has cooled down, while lard tends to keep your foods a little softer. This is why I love making Chocolate Chip Cookies with Lard.

Can it really be used in place of butter?

Yep. I make grilled cheese by slathering the outside of each piece of bread with lard instead of butter.

 

 

Does lard taste like bacon?

What are some other great fats to use in the kitchen?

Can you Buy Good Lard?

You can absolutely source good lard, either as fat that you can render down yourself, or as already rendered lard. Here are some tips:

If we didn’t raise our own pigs and render our own lard, I would definitely order a monthly box of meat, get free filet for a year (seriously! Every subscription comes with $420-worth of free filet!), add in a few orders of lard with every month’s box, and stay stocked up on the best meat… make sure you use code SOULYRESTED if this all sounds amazing to you too & save $30 on your first order.

You can also find pork fat, in all of its “stages” on Amazon:

Items I Use Every time I Render Lard:

The post Complete Guide to Rendering Lard 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.