Chicharones Revisted

Bacon rind chicharones.

Just when I thought bacon couldn't get any better, someone inspires me to deep fry bacon skin for pork rinds. Boy howdy this works, and the flavor is crispy bubbly bacon air.

In the previous episode, I revealed the secrets to making restaurant quality chicharones at home. It's a fun parlor trick to impress your foodie friends, but making them out of bacon rinds is an important step forward the evolution of pork rinds that should appreciated by both the amateur and the enthusiast alike. My thanks goes regular reader TC for the comment that triggered this bacon revelation. TC, I hope you test this recipe and post your results soon.



Making Bacon

For these chicharones you're gonna need to make some bacon. Never made bacon before? No worries (as the kids say), check out my internationally recognized bacon manifesto, in it are detailed instructions on how to make bacon at home.


To remove the skin you can either slice it off while it is still warm, or or wait a day and peel it off when it cold. The advantage to the cold peel is that there is less fat adhering to the skin. But be careful there can be spots where the fat really wants to stick and come off in large chunks. Go slow and steady and you'll be fine.

Place the peeled skins flat in a pot and cover with water. Set to simmer. After about an hour check for doneness: If you can easily poke your finger through the skin, it's done.



Once cool, scrape the skins. It's annoying, but the cleaner they are, the more they pop.



Once clean, cut the skins into Frito sized shapes and put them into a very low oven (or dehydrator) to dry. After several hours (four to twelve depending on the oven temp) you should have a hard, unbending bacon chit.



Set up the fryer station, heat to 375F.



Drop a few in at a time and hold them under the oil. After a few seconds they should pop. They should be done cooking in about thirty seconds.



Toss with seasoning. Salt and pepper is fine, or try some sort of mixture. I put together sumac, dried thyme, and sesame seeds ( that's za'atar, yo) along with a little citric acid, for a flavoring I call Dorito.

Tasty bacon flavor in a crispy snack. Try it!

Cheers.

Pondering the Pig Skin

In this episode: Making chicharones at home, I got fired.

Many a gastropub in our fair city sport "housemade chicharones" on their menu. And why not? Fried pork skins are exotic, easy to make, and cheap. And, freshly made chicaharones are a refreshing revelation compared to their store bought compadres. Got a party coming up, want to impress your foodie friends with crispy craklings? Let's make chicharones.




As usual, the hardest part of this exercise is finding the pork skin, but you don't need much, a couple of pounds should be plenty. Try looking for a latino or asian grocery, a meat packer, or special order from a butcher, somebody has this stuff laying around. At the restaurant, we got our pork skins from Grant Park Packing.

Cut the skins into large squares so that they will fit into your pot. Fill with water and bring them to a zippy simmer. They are done when they have softened enough that you can easily poke your finger through the skins, but not so cooked that they are falling apart. It should take 1 1/2 to 2 hours. Drain and allow to cool.



Now the skins need to be cleaned. You want nothing but skin, use a knife to remove the fatty rinds. It's tedious work but you can do it.



Once the skins are scraped clean, cut them in to little one inch squares, It sounds small but these babies will grow five times their size when they hit the fryer.



Before we break out the fryer, our little pork chips need to be dried. Using wire racks and trays, dehydrate the chicharones in the oven at a low temperature, 160 to 200 F is fine. Or use a dehydrator. I used my oven. Depending of the temperature, 6-12 hours of drying will give you a good hard chit. They should not bend at all. Did I say this was easy? It is, just complicated.

Once dry, the chicharones will keep forever under refrigeration. Now you just need a party. To set up your frying station, you need a couple inches of oil and a pot. The larger the pot, the more oil, the you can fry at one time. Using a thermometer, heat oil to 350F, and start frying. They take less than a minute. Drain your little crispys and tosswith salt and pepper. If you're feeling daffy, make up different seasonings, like smoked paprika and granulated garlic. I made a puckery mix of sumac and citric acid. At the restaurant we used dehydrated lime powder and parmesan powder. We got these industrial ingredients from Terra Spice Company.

Ah yes "at the restaurant." In my previous post I mentioned that I was working in a restaurant, and didn't have the time to blog. Well the wait is over, last week I was unceremoniously dumped, and now I have plenty to time to look for another paying job, or blog. I worked for Three Floyds Brewpub for a year and a half and overall it was a great experience. I started out as a prep cook, for a brief time worked as the kitchen manager, and I had some fun cutting up hogs and making sausages. High points included running a menu that included an Alsatian Onion Tart (Flammekueche), a Montreal pastrami (Viande Fumée) and a Thai sausage (AKA the Bangkok Brat). I also had the opportunity to work for Chef Mike Sheerin. With him I participated in The Cochon555 event and the Green Market City BBQ. I learned a lot and in the coming months I will share some of these special nuggets with you. So strap on your sausage hats, it's time to get cooking (at home!) again.



Cheers.

2010: The Year in Sausage

My favorite food posts of 2010.

What a year. Here are some highlights of the past year in Sausage.



In January I tried to make Andouillettes. Epic Fail as the kids say. Read about it in "The Great Adouillette Wreck"




In February I made snails, canned and otherwise "On the Snail Trail"




In March I learned that the Ultimate Breakfast Sausage Recipe is something that is earned rather than found.




Then April, oh April. I submitted an entry to a bacon competition, [Rejected] But I'm glad, I didn't want to have to wear a funny bacon hat.




In May I discovered the wonderful world of crépinettes.




World Cup kicked off the summer, I wrote about the South African Boerewors and the Algerian Merguez.




In July I sniffed out a sausage trail in Southwest Michgan




And in September we had the fourth and largest edition of the high sausage holiday, Oktoberfest

And now the future.

I don't know what's going to happen with this blog. I got a job working in a restaurant. It's a really cool place, I've been on since April. Someday I would like to regale you with the tale of how I got a job through Twitter. In the meantime, you can follow whatever adventure I'm having on twitter and on flickr. And I'll get back to the business of writing about sausage soon.

Happy cooking.



Cheers.

Happy Thanksgiving

Wanna make Thanksgiving sausage or just need some basic tips for smoking a turkey? Here's some old posts to help get your day right.

Thanksgiving in a Tube


MAC's Holiday Turkey Tips



Happy Thanksgiving.



Cheers.

Oktoberfest Wrap Up

Oh suffer little sausage blog. I'm sorry I wasn't able to do live blogging from Sausage Week, but we did have some fun. Here's the Recap:



I started the Saturday before with a trip to T&J Meat Packing. I picked up a pork belly and some hocks. I put them into a cure using the recipe from Taking Back Bacon.



Monday, I picked up a hank of hog casings from Howard's in Munster.

Tuesday, we lost power. I was supposed to cut up chickens and make stock, but instead went out to dinner.

Wednesday, smoked bacon, cut up chickens made stock.



Thursday, Bonne Femme made 30 lbs of German potato salad...



I made 200 shells for puffs. The Columbus crew (Mom, JL and GMA) arrive.



Friday, Jerry and Kevin came over we set up the dueling grinders and ran 35 lbs of pork and 10 lbs of chicken through the plates. We made Wiesswurst, bratwurst, bacon bratwurst, cheddar brats and chicken Parmesan sausages.











Saturday, Weisen. I picked-up a keg of Munsterfest from 3 Floyds



I think this is the last year for my 40 y.o. lederhosen on little E. Here's his battle pose:



Meanwhile in the kitchen Mom and JL made pretzels





Dipped in a lye solution.



The best pretzels in Chicago. For those who asked, I never did get my mom's 'top secret' recipe, but I did spy a copy of Peter Reinhart's artisan breads every day : fast and easy recipes for world-class breads. Look for the pretzel recipe there. She made several batches ahead of time, then froze the shaped pretzels. This seemed to work well.



JL made Pastry cream which we put into squeeze bottles so party goers could make their own cream puffs. All the puffs got gobbled up before I could get a picture.





Remember the hocks from earlier in the week? I braised them in stock and cider along with sauerkraut, onion and apples until they fell apart. They became the bed where I held the grilled sausage for service.



Friends brought some exotic and not so exotic condiments:







Weisen (the field)



Here's Links to more photos.

Josh's Oktoberfest pictures

Eric's Oktoberfest pictures

Saucisson MAC's Oktoberfest pictures on flickr


Thank you everyone for a great time.

Cheers.

How to cook house cured bacon

It's all the rage.

O’zapft is! Time to get to the Wiesn.

Webcam 1: Wirtsbudenstraße

Sausage Week 2010. Oktoberfest started today in Munich. Mayor Christian Ude tapped the keg at noon. Above is a live shot from the fest. You can check all the activity on the webcams at the Oktoberfest Website.

Today also marks the beginning of Sausage Week 2010. Have you ever wanted to have an Oktoberfest in your back yard? Follow along I'll show you how.

Prosit.