is pig fat, obtained by rendering down the deposits which exist between the flesh and the skin and around the internal organs of pig carcasses. It is bland and white, and its ubiquity in an age when pigs were kept by all those who could afford them made it very important in the traditional cookery of Europe, the Americas, and China. The fat of the pig was an article of almost as much value as the meat. Lard contains much saturated fat, and this, combined with an image as poverty food and the increased availability of butter and oils, means that it is less important than formerly in the developed world.
There are several fat deposits in pig carcasses. The flare is found inside the loin and around the kidneys; it produces the finest lard, sometimes called leaf lard. The back fat is a hard layer between the flesh and the skin, which also yields good-quality lard. Softer lard is extracted from the fat around the internal organs, and fat belly pork contains layers of both types. These fats can also be used before rendering; the hard back fat is cut into cubes and preserved by salting for addition to stews in much of S. Europe. In French cuisine it is employed for larding lean meat and wrapping pâtés; the caul, which contains some of the soft fat, is also used for wrapping.
Because of differences in quality, and the rate at which it melts, the fat from different parts of the carcass was prepared separately and used for different purposes. However, the general principle of rendering lard is simple: the fat is freed from flesh and membrane as far as possible, minced, soaked, and heated gently until it can be strained off the residue. The old-fashioned method for storing the best lard was to pour it into the well-cleaned pig's bladder and hang it in a cool place; the poor-quality lard from around the internal organs was always used quickly. Lard is sometimes seasoned; paprika is used for this in Spain, and chopped parsley in Italy. Modern packaged lard is produced by heating the fat with steam; it may be treated with bleaching and deodorizing agents, emulsifiers and antioxidants, or modified to improve creaming properties.
In keeping with the tradition of not wasting any part of the pig, the bits of membrane left in the pan, cooked by the action of heat on the fat, are used as salty snacks or eaten on bread; see crackling.
Lard has many uses, especially in areas where plant oils and dairy fats are scarce. It acts as a spread, a preservative, a shortener, and a cooking medium. In both Europe and N. America, it was formerly much used on bread or toast. William Cobbett wrote in Cottage Economy (1823) that country children were badly brought up if they did not like sweet lard spread upon bread, and recorded that he had eaten it for luncheon at ‘the houses of good and substantial farmers in France and Flanders’, whilst lamenting that the habit was declining as ‘now-a-days, the labourers, and especially the female part of them, have fallen into the taste of niceness in food’. It is now uncommon to find lard as a spread in Europe and the USA, but, salted and flavoured with paprika, it is still used on toasted bread in country areas in Spain.
The use of lard as a preservative is best illustrated by the confits of pork or goose made in SW France. These rely on cooking pieces of meat gently in large amounts of fat and then leaving the whole to cool so that the lard sets, covering the food. As this has been sterilized by the heat and the lard forms an airtight seal, the meat keeps for several months, and pieces can be removed at intervals provided the rest remains well covered. Although such methods are no longer necessary with modern storage techniques, they are still a part of the cuisine of this region, and the meat is used alone or as an ingredient for cassoulet.
Like all fats, lard is composed of crystals. These are relatively large (compared to those found, for instance, in butter) and make it a poor creaming fat but an effective shortener for pastry. Thus there are few cakes which use lard, but many pastries. Even the English lardy cake is really a bread dough enriched with lard by rolling and folding the dough around the fat. In the past, lard was the favoured fat for shortcrust pastry in the English kitchen, but modern shorteners are slowly replacing it. A mixture of lard for good shortening and butter for fine flavour were mostly used. It is also used for hot water pastry, setting as the paste cools, allowing for the traditional method of shaping the dough for raised pies by hand and baking them without the support of a mould. A little lard is often included in bread and pastry recipes both in Britain and continental Europe, and it is used to shorten many traditional Spanish biscuits, such as the fragile Christmas polverones. Lard is also used in the Latin American kitchen for enriching breads, pastries, and dough for fritters; and in China for making pastries and biscuits.
The use of lard for frying has been in decline in western countries, eroded by vegetable oils with their healthier image. It is still the preferred fat in some English regions for fish and chips. As a cooking medium, it had been popular because readily available, and also because it has a relatively high smoke point (205 °C, 400 °F). Thus it was much used for traditional fritter recipes in Europe and America, and the collective German name for these is still Schmalzgebackenes, meaning ‘something fried in lard’. According to Chang (1977) lard is still a preferred cooking fat in parts of China, notably the Fukien coast and the far west; in these areas, pigs are specially bred to be fat and display maximal separation of lean meat and fat in the carcass, allowing for easy separation of the two.
Laura Mason has written about several aspects of British food in books including Sugar Plums and Sherbet (1998), Farmhouse Cookery (2005), and Traditional Foods of Britain (1999), which she co-authored with Catherine Brown.
Chang, K. C. (ed) (1977), Food in Chinese Culture, New Haven: Yale UP.
