Ingredient

Lard

Lard is rendered pork fat, and for pastry it does something butter cannot: it produces a flakier, shorter, more tender result. It fell out of British kitchens for reasons of fashion and marketing rather than of cooking, and it is worth having back.

Why it makes better pastry

Lard is close to a hundred per cent fat, where butter is around eighty per cent fat and the rest largely water. In pastry that water turns to steam and develops gluten as it goes, which is why an all-butter shortcrust is more prone to toughness.

Lard also forms larger fat crystals than butter, which means bigger flakes and a more distinctly layered result. A pastry made half with lard and half with butter is the traditional British compromise: the flake from the lard and the flavour from the butter.

It is also excellent for frying, being stable and flavourful, and it is the traditional fat for roast potatoes in a great many households.

The grades

Leaf lard

From the soft fat around the kidneys. The finest — white, clean, barely porky. The one to use for pastry and cakes.

Fatback lard

From the back. Firmer, slightly more flavour. Good general-purpose fat.

Caul fat

Not lard but the lacy membrane around the organs, used for wrapping rather than rendering.

Block lard from a supermarket

Often hydrogenated and deodorised for shelf stability. Perfectly usable for pastry and duller than rendered lard.

Dripping

Rendered beef fat, not pork. Different flavour, and traditionally the roast-potato fat in the north of England.

Rendering your own

Ask a butcher for pork back fat or leaf fat. It is usually very cheap.

1. Cut the fat into small cubes, or mince it, or freeze it briefly and grate it. Smaller pieces render faster and more completely.
2. Put it in a heavy pan with a splash of water to stop it catching before the fat starts to run.
3. Set it over the lowest heat you can manage and leave it. It should barely bubble. An oven at a very low temperature works even better.
4. Stir occasionally. Over an hour or two the fat will run clear and the solid pieces will shrink and brown.
5. Strain through muslin into clean jars while still liquid. It sets white and firm.
6. Keep the browned solids — these are scratchings, and they are the cook's reward.

What to use it for

• Shortcrust and hot-water-crust pastry. The hot-water crust for a pork pie is made with lard by definition.
• Roast potatoes, where it gives a crisper result than oil and a better flavour than most.
• Frying eggs, bread and black pudding, in the traditional British breakfast.
• Refried beans and Mexican cooking, where lard is the authentic fat and a genuine flavour component.
• Tamales, where it is beaten into the masa and is structurally necessary.
• Confit, in place of duck fat, which works well and is much cheaper.
• Greasing a tin for anything savoury, where its flavour is welcome.

Common questions