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Dick Margulis

Alan wrote:

>
> I forgot about all those other animal fats! I remember my
> Mom using lard. And I remember being the kid who loved to
> knead that white margarine into yellow margarine. But I'm
> too young to know about those other fats, except that I HAVE
> heard of them in reading about cooking!
>
> Alan Moorman
>

Umm, well, let's see. You've read about them, have you? <g>

In the 1970s I worked for about a year in a small, upscale butcher shop,
and people used to come in to ask for the kidney suet for their mince
pies (it's a required ingredient for true mincemeat). And my
refrigerator right now has a tub of goose fat (not much left from last
year's Christmas goose*) and a jar of duck fat (I buy duck breasts
throughout the year; the meat goes into various dishes and I render the
fat.) I don't use chicken schmalz, because my wife the Mayflower
descendant has expressed her general disinterest in and distaste for all
things culinary of the central and eastern European traditions; so the
dishes I'd use schmalz for are kind of off the menu except when she's
off on a speaking tour and I'm cooking for myself. But, as I said, I can
go to Stop & Shop and buy it anytime if I need it.

Dick

* Last year's Christmas goose was not a Christmas goose. That is, it was
not what you'd picture--a whole roast fowl glistening on a platter,
ready to be carved like a turkey. Instead, I used my old family recipe:
Skin and joint the goose. Put a layer of cabbage (sauerkraut is an
alternative, but too radical for Christmas) in the bottom of a roaster,
a layer of sliced onions, and a generous quantity of peppercorns; then
lay the joints on top of this and roast, covered--in my grandmother's
old MagnaLite covered roaster--basting occasionally. The skin, rendered,
produced a quart or so of pure white fat plus the ganse griebens
(sp?)--cracklings--most of which I ate while I was puttering in the
kitchen and the rest of which I mixed into a paté I made from the liver
for an hors d'oeuvre.