The Pig Adventure Threak - Day by Day - Updated with all four days!!

Originally Posted by Douglas

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Those "grillades" sound and look just stupid, stupid good.

+1.

Tender cuts of pork? Check.
Garlic? Check.
Duck fat? Check.
Wine? Check.

Is that a cashmere hoodie?

Btw, how did you even come up with the idea of this trip?

Originally Posted by texas_jack

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You people have some weird ass hobbies.

lol. +1

But it would be a good idea to at least learn how to butcher..there will be a time when it's needed. Be it out on your own and you've caught a wild hare, or stranded with an SF member in the middle of nowhere.

Originally Posted by Mr Herbert

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looking forward to the hams

I'm pretty sure we do that today. My wife and I leave tomorrow to do some other things around the area, so it is possibly that we won't see that part. The two of us will do almost everything, but there are some things we won't get to. The teacher does these over the weekend, and then my mother, who is with us and lives in the area, picks everything up on Monday and sends whatever will get through customs home to us. I guess she eats the rest.

Originally Posted by Douglas

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Those "grillades" sound and look just stupid, stupid good.

Yes, very easy and very good.

Originally Posted by Connemara

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Is that a cashmere hoodie?

No, but I'll give it to you, and don't let the lack of cashmere stop you from trying to sell it on SF. Find a good price.

Originally Posted by GQgeek

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Btw, how did you even come up with the idea of this trip?

The teacher has become a friend of my mother over the years, and she asked us if we wanted to do it. Normally, she teaches one day things. The pig is a bit more intensive.

Watching your progression.

Reminds me of my childhood. Never made blood sausage. Just made regular sausage and did quite a bit of salt curing. Nothing like a home cured country ham...

Originally Posted by Connemara

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Is that a cashmere hoodie?

Does it matter if it's Attolini, Anna M. or not?

Originally Posted by iammatt

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No, but I'll give it to you, and don't let the lack of cashmere stop you from trying to sell it on SF. Find a good price.



Go for it.

I'll pay the shipping.

From San Fran to conne, not from Europe to conne ( I'm cheap ).

In his defense, conne has never railed against Pork.

Originally Posted by texas_jack

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You people have some weird ass hobbies.

+1.

envious. everyone should do something like this once, just to get an appreciation of where food like this comes from.

This thread actually made me do some research on pig farms in my area. I don't need a whole pig but will see if I can find someone that wants to go halves with me. This just looks like way too much fun.

Wowsers!

Butchering a pig is the new Sardines.

Best.threak.ever.

Day 3:
We worked hard during days one and two, very hard. However, it didn't seem like a lot was being done. At the end of the second day, we had relatively little to show for our efforts. That changed on day three.

First we set the rillettes to cook. The fattiest parts are added to a massive stock pot and cooked over very low heat until the fat is liquefied:


When it is melted, we add all of the scraps from the previous two days. This includes meat that is not useful for other preparations, bones which have been cleaned but still contain small bits of meat, and any other remaining scrap not suitable for roasting fresh:


The meat is then cooked until very tender, over a low heat for many hours. It will be packed into cans on day four.
Next we set out to confit pork rind for future use in making stews and bean dishes more velvety. The rinds are seasoned and then rolled:



Finally they are cooked over low heat in duck and pork fat and then stored in the fat until use:

Next it is time to prepare pork liver pate. This is the basic country pate that should be pretty familiar to everybody. One third lean pork, one third pork fat and one third pork liver is ground by hand:


It is then seasoned with salt, pepper and quatre epice.

Then it is packed into cans, ready for sterilization and storage so that it can be eaten at any time over the next year or so:

From there we move on to making an elegant sausage. Since we have leftover foie gras trimmings from making the pate de foie gras the day before, and we have truffles from the forest on the property, we decide to make a sausage mixture using the two. Starting with our base of ground pork, we add chunks of truffle mixed with cubes of foie gras around a half centimeter in size:


We will stuff this into casing tomorrow, but it is lunchtime, and since we are in possession of fresh pig caul, it just makes sense to prepare some crepinettes as an hors d'ouvre:


For lunch we also prepare a parmentier of blood sausage which is served with a mustard and onion sauce. First mashed potatoes are spread in a gratin dish and blood sausage sliced lengthwise is put on top:

Then the sausages are covered with another layer of mashed potatoes, and the whole thing is placed in the oven until it browns lightly. This is not a light lunch, but we have done a lot of work.

Earlier in the day we started to prepare the pigs head, and now it is time to make the pate de tete, or head cheese. The head goes into a strong court bouillon, and it simmers until very tender.


Several hours later it is ready, and extremely gelatinous:

We pick all of the meat from the bones, and make a decision to chop the pieces finely, as nobody in the group is a big fan of head cheese with large pieces:

Then, as usual, we pack everything into little cans for sterilization and storage. It should be noted that each of the canned dishes could be done just as well in mason jars, but it is much easier to ship canned goods back home than jarred ones.

This is an interesting picture, though not really all that important. We are grinding pork belly fat, which is extremely fine, into a paste which will be used to prepare puff pastry for lunch tomorrow. Waste not, want not.

Next we make enchaux de pork, or at least I think that is the name of this preparation. To do so we season large pieces of the fattier end of the pork loin and stuff them into large cans. These are then cooked in the canner for three hours and then cooled and stored. When opened the meat is served with its own gelatinous sauce, and is, apparently, quite tasty. I have to say that I am slightly skeptical of this preparation:


The day's final preparation is petit sale. We take pork breast, both in large pieces and cut into individual ribs, and we cook in an extremely salty court bouillon for half an hour:

Then we fit the pork as tightly as possible in a crock, pour over the cooking liquid and weight down with rocks (sorry for the non-sanitary rocks, Douglas):


These petit sale are then kept in the crock for a minimum of one month, at which time they can be cooked again in unsalted water for another hour and added to simmering beans or lentils making a delicious dinner.
That is the end of the day three work. A lot got done, and we are extremely tired. Luckily our host has prepared a lovely daube de boeuf in the fireplace for us. It has cooked, on and off, for three days, and is now ready to eat. We need energy for the next day:

Day four: Day four resembles day one in that we worked hard, but made few dishes. We only had half a day, so time was limited. After we left, our teacher filled the rest of the sausages for us to pick up later. Other than that, we got through the entire pig in our four days. First, we fill the more elegant sausages of pork, foie gras and truffle. Here are some of them, there were many more: We ate them for dinner that night upon returning to our house with a dish of mashed potato and truffle. Delicious. Next we pick through the rillettes to remove all of the bones: No shortage of rillette here: This meat is then ground through the largest hole on the grinder and packed into cans for conservation: After this we attack the two hams. This is a very difficult job and it requires three people. First we dry the ham with paper towels and try to soak up all of the blood: Then the areas with visible meat are rubbed with ground pepper: After this, a cloth is put down on a large plate, and a layer of salt on top of the cloth: From here, two people hold the cloth up while a third adds salt. The idea is to have a uniform layer of salt over the entire piece of meat: We then pin the cloth in place, and sew in the pleats so that everything is very tight and the ham cures evenly. Next, we put the hams into the ham box and cover it with cooled ash from the fire (no pic.) It sits in the box for 45 days, and then is cleaned, rubbed with herbs and hung in a cool area for a few months minimum. Lunch is next, and we are having a tart of winter vegetables and foie gras, with a salad and more of the brochettes we enjoyed on day two. First the sautà ed vegetables are put in a tart dish: Then foie gras is added, and the whole thing is topped with the puff pastry made with the pork belly fat from day three: Now we eat: A nice homemade baba and local cheese for dessert: Finishing up after lunch, we continue to use the canning pot and to sterilize and preserve all that we have done: