La-Di-La-Di… Lard - Pork Pie

I prefer butter in my baking. I add oil to pizza and bread dough, but I hardly ever use margarine, and lard I had never used until now that I saw some interesting pie recipes with lard in the crust.  

Somehow I had got the idea that I would need to ask lard from a butcher’s shop where they would have it hidden behind the counter. After asking for it the butcher would hand me a suspicious-looking white ‘blob’ hanging loosely from a piece of pig’s skin with blue stamps on it… Well, this image of lard in my head probably associates with a Glaswegian gangster Aloysious “Lard” O’Connor – an imposing character in Alexander McCall Smith’s 44 Scotland Street series books – who in  Espresso Tales (2005) is described as “an extremely overweight man” with “fleshy tattooed forearms”.

What comes to the butcher’s I was wrong. There seems to be lard available in every supermarket, neatly packed and piled on the shelves beside the butter I always buy.  This does make sense after I read about the industrial processing of lard and the type of pig fat used for it. You can find instructions how to make lard at home, too, but I don’t think I would bother after buying the nice package costing only 0,59€/250g. 

I browsed various recipes to get ideas for my very first pork pie with a lard crust and decided to use simple ingredients for the filling:  minced pork, smoked bacon, onion and spices.  And some jelly too, just to see if/how it works out.

Crust:

200g lard

2,5dl / 1 cup water

9-10dl / 3½-4 cups plain flour

1. Put the water and lard in a pan over low heat until the lard melts.

2. Add the flour and mix with a spoon until the dough is smooth.

3. Let the dough cool down a little and roll it into a firm ball and let it rest while you make the filling.

Filling:

600g minced pork

200g smoked bacon rashers, chopped

1 onion, chopped

1 clove of garlic, crushed

1-2 tsp salt (if the bacon is very salty, 1tsp is enough)

black pepper, paprika, dried parsley, dried chives

Glazing:

1 egg yolk 

Jelly (optional):

2,5dl / 1 cup vegetable stock

2 gelatine leaves

1. Fry the chopped onion on a pan with some oil. (not necessary but I wanted to make sure the onion is well-cooked when the pie is ready)

2. Mix the minced pork with the chopped bacon, (fried) onion and crushed garlic. Add salt and spices. - Fry a little filling on a pan if you want to check the taste.

3. Grease a loose base cake pan with lard.

4. Take about 2/3 of the dough and press it around the pan, both bottom and sides. For the lid roll the rest of the dough to a circle (a little bigger than the pan).

5. Place the pork mixture evenly on the crust.

6. Put the lid on carefully and pinch the edges together with your fingers. Make a hole in the centre of the lid. If you have any dough left roll it and use a cookie cutter for making decorations.

7. Glaze the lid with egg yolk.

8. Bake in the oven for about 1h 30 min at 175°C / 350°F.

9. Let the baked pie cool in the pan.

10. If you want to add jelly soak the gelatine leaves in cold water for 5 minutes and add them to the hot vegetable stock. Using a funnel, pour the smooth liquid into the hole in the pie.

11. Let the pie set in the fridge at least for 4 hours, then remove the pie from the pan carefully and serve with salad or pickled or sour cucumbers. 

 

Cook’s Notes: 

*Crust made of lard is very easy to handle as it is not sticky at all. I hardly needed any flour even when rolling the lid.

*I found it hard to get the liquid made of vegetable stock and gelatine poured into the pie. It just did not go in but flooded all around. Maybe the filling was too tight and there should be left some room between the lid and the filling (if possible)?

Jury’s Comments:

"Add some roughly chopped apple and a few tablespoons of Calvados next time you make it." (Husband, Calvados Lover)

"Where is the ‘like’ button?" (Son, 13, Screenager and Mouse Potato)

"I love what’s inside but not what’s outside [crust]." (The Little Brother, 6, Carnivore)

"It’s not that nice [but I tasted it!]." (Daughter, 9, Open-minded Critic)

"I’m going to the chipper." (Daughter, 17, Chipperian by Heart)

"Zzzzzz…" (Cats)