Lard

You should be able to buy it at any local grocery store also look for manteca, it's the same thing just turn the box around and suprise !!! ... LARD

Any Mexican meat market (carneceria) will have lard. Make sure it has very little (if that much) aroma, before buying. The alternative is to order "leaf lard" from a good butcher and render it yourself. Love baking with lard, and fortunately it's easy to get good lard inexpensively here. It's harder in other parts of the country, but NYC being NYC it's there somewhere.

BDL

Manteca is the Spanish word for lard. It should be pretty much odorless. You can find it in the same grocery aisle with foods of Latin America/Mexico, in packages similar to the size of a butter box or in a plastic bucket. It doesn't need refrigeration (although I'd refrigerate it, tightly wrapped, after opening). It should be cold when you use it for pastry such as pie dough, so it stays in small bits rather than smearing into the flour.

 

Every large supermarket where I live (southeastern Wisconsin USA) has lard in stock.

Manteca is spanish for lard ... I've noticed the last several years that they started putting lard on one side of the box and manteca on the other .... it should also be in the cooking oil isle and depending who put it on the shelf and how much a hurry they were in it will either say lard or manteca.

 

Of course if you want to pay extra you can always get it in a hispanic store :P

Every supermarket around here stocks it, but not always in the same place.

 

At Mejier it's on an end-cap in the dairy section. At Kroger it's over by the fresh meats. Etc. You may have to ask for it where you shop.

 

Lard comes packed in plastic "buckets" that range in size from one pound (about the size of a whipped-butter container), to three pounds and five pounds.

 

One thing to watch for: Some packagers salt their lard. In general you want to avoid that brand.

Lard is made from rendered pork fat and is used because it imparts no particular flavor of it's own and makes a very flaky crust and in the south at least is used to make biscuits (yummm)

is it really good?

 

Good doesn't begin to describe it, KK.

 

For certain applications, such as pie crust, nothing compares to lard. Shortening, and even butter, run a poor second.

 

Why does it make such a difference? I dunno. I'm sure there's a scientific explanation. But the reason doesn't matter. Pragmatically, you will notice the difference right away.

 

BTW, I see that lard and butter are now on the good-guys list. This week, anyway. So don't hesitate to fry with the lard. There, again, it adds aunique flavor that isn't available with any other fat or oil.

 

The irony is, as Highlander points out, that pure lard has no distinctive flavor of its own. But when combined with other ingredients something magical happens.

Good lard plays much the same role in baking as the parsley in a bouquet garni does in a stock. It's not so much what it brings, as what it doesn't. That is, it leaves a very clean taste.

It's also better for making flaky pie crusts, biscuits and other flaky goodness things than vegetable shortening and/or butter. That has to do with how the respective substances maintain separation between the layers of surrounding dough, and prevent steam from penetrating from one to the other. Unfortunately, great many people (present company excepted) don't actually know what "flaky" means and confuse it with "tender" instead of contrasting it with "crumbly," much less how to make it happen.

BDL

Well actually they are now coming out with studies that claim that lard is healthy for you ... check out this google search

http://www.google.com/search?q=is+lard+good+for+you&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a

right next to the Crisco, go figure.

 

Seems to me, KK, that that's the logical place for it. It certainly makes more sense than all the places I find it. I mean, next tothe dairy? What's with that! Anyway, glad you found it.

 

.....that claim that lard is healthy for you

 

That's what I was talking about, Highlander, when I said it's now on the good-guys list. Until they change their minds yet again!

I buy a pound or two of pork fat from my local grocery store and render it myself.  Put it in the freezer just long enough to firm up a bit then cut it into small pieces and place in a thick pan with a bit of water and on medium heat.  I strain it through a paper towel into a jelly jar then refrigerate.  Like salt, it seems to release and amalgamate all the flavors.  When cooking beans or a tomato sauce try throwing a tablespoon in.  Nothing is better for tamale dough, frijoles refrito and of course, pie crust.

At the grocery stores I frequent you can usually find it floating on the shelves around the meat counter, in the hispanic foods section (both on the shelves or in the coolers by the tortillas) or sometimes over by the oils (this seems to be the less frequent place though).  If you can't find it there just ask.  Chances are they stock it.

I believe the Morrell Snowcap lard is hydrogenated, which has the negatives of  the old formula Crisco, or margerine from the health viewpoint. If this is still the case I'm only bringing it up for informational purposes.  When we lived in a city, often it was the only choice for lard, but occasionally non hydrogenated lard was available, usually found in the refrigerated section. In usage I couldn't tell the difference.

I forgot to mention, if it is important to you, just read the label.

The bricks and tubOlards you usually see in the grocery stores are hygrogenated.  If you render your own then you're rewarded with chicharones.  The longer you let it go for, the porkier it gets.

My people cooked with the kosher version of lard: schmaltz, or rendered chicken fat. It's never used in baking, but was a common substitute for butter in meat dishes. (Those who follow kosher rules don't mix dairy and meat.) My grandmother's rule of thumb when making potato kugel was, "It isn't good unless the schmaltz runs from the beard." No wonder my mom chose not to cook like her mom- at least when it came to using fats in savory dishes! Our version of chicarrones is called "gribenes". My family added onions to cook in with the rendering fat, so those sweet bits added to the appeal.