I save all my animal bones for stock. I don't always separate them, though I generally separate say lamb from chicken. (The strong taste of lamb can overpower chicken.) Bones are also good tucked into a pot of beans or a stew or braise, to enrich the sauce; just remember to fish them out before serving.
If you save all of your veggie scraps, it can be very easy to make stock without even putting extra vegetables in. Onion and garlic skins, herb stems, tomato skins, potato peelings (not green ones), squash guts, all of this can go into stock. The only thing I don't put into the stockpot is trimmings from cruciferous vegetables and anything that is rotten or moldy. (This probably goes without saying.) I like to add celery seed to my stock because we don't use a lot of fresh celery and it can balance the sweetness of squash and onion.
I really like pork fat with beans; I just had some pork chops that had a very thick layer of fat, so I cut that off and put it into a braise of beans and beef shoulder. It came out very nicely!
My favorite use for pork skin is to get it crispy and eat it straight. You can also fry the fat up. (Save the rendered fat for other cooking, and eat the crispy part.)
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2012-01-03 05:37 pm (UTC)If you save all of your veggie scraps, it can be very easy to make stock without even putting extra vegetables in. Onion and garlic skins, herb stems, tomato skins, potato peelings (not green ones), squash guts, all of this can go into stock. The only thing I don't put into the stockpot is trimmings from cruciferous vegetables and anything that is rotten or moldy. (This probably goes without saying.) I like to add celery seed to my stock because we don't use a lot of fresh celery and it can balance the sweetness of squash and onion.
I really like pork fat with beans; I just had some pork chops that had a very thick layer of fat, so I cut that off and put it into a braise of beans and beef shoulder. It came out very nicely!
My favorite use for pork skin is to get it crispy and eat it straight. You can also fry the fat up. (Save the rendered fat for other cooking, and eat the crispy part.)