You can make homemade smoked lard in an ordinary kitchen, without having a specialized smokehouse. I propose a method that in some respects is superior to even conventional smokehouses, since it only requires a handful of wood chips and eliminates direct contact with the smoke.
Smoking equipment
To carry out smoking you will need:
- an old unnecessary saucepan with a tight lid, or even better, a Soviet pressure cooker;
- aluminum food foil;
- shallow plate;
- 2 metal stands for hot pots;
- wood chips.
How to smoke
For smoking I use an old Soviet pressure cooker, the lid of which is tightly closed, which completely eliminates the escape of smoke. It is possible to use ordinary pots and cauldrons. In this case, you need to wrap the lid with 2-3 layers of foil, making a sealing gasket. It will also help if the lid has a hole for steam to escape.
To facilitate further washing of the pan, you need to lay a layer of foil on its bottom. In this case, ash and smoke will remain on it. Next, I lay a handful of chips from alder or fruit trees; it is possible to use a mixture of chips in the same proportion.You can prepare the fuel yourself by cutting a branch with a knife, or buy it at the supermarket. Wood chips are usually sold in the section with barbecue coals and skewers. If salted lard is used, the fuel must be soaked in water for 10 minutes. In this case, the chips will produce smoke longer. Since I smoke boiled lard, I use dry wood chips.
I place a hot stand on top of the layer of foil and wood chips. It is round, chosen specifically for the pan, so it is placed directly on the bottom. If you use a cauldron instead of a pressure cooker, the stand simply rests on its walls, which is not critical.
I place a plate on it to collect the melted fat draining from the lard. He shouldn't get on the wood chips. Contact between fat and fuel is undesirable, since the resulting smoke will not be at all what is needed for smoking.
A second stand is installed on the plate.
Lard is placed on it.
Due to the fact that it lies on the grill, the smoke will envelop the piece evenly.
I close the pan tightly and put it on the fire. I open the burner for a maximum of 5 minutes to activate the smoldering process of the wood chips. After this, I reduce the heat to a minimum, just to maintain the release of smoke, and keep it like that for 20 minutes. When using raw salted lard, you need to keep it on high heat for 15 minutes, and on low heat for 20-25 minutes, which is permissible, since in this case the wood chips are soaked and they will not ignite.
When the time is up, I remove the pan from the heat and leave it for a couple of hours. The lid cannot be opened. During this time, the smoke will be completely absorbed into the lard, and its remains will settle to the bottom. Subsequently, when you open the lid, it will no longer be there. The lard needs to be put in the refrigerator to harden. While it is warm, it cuts poorly.
The resulting product fully corresponds to standard hot smoked lard. Of course, it does not last as long as cold smoked ones. The pan doesn't hold much, so you can cook no more than a kilogram at a time, which can realistically be eaten in a week.
Preparing lard before smoking
- Before smoking, it is necessary to salt or boil the lard. The first method allows you to obtain a classic product, but requires, depending on the technology used, from several days to 3 weeks. If you pre-cook the lard in spices, you can smoke it on the same day.
- The longest method involves wet salting. First the brine is made. Salt is added and dissolved in a volume of water sufficient to completely cover the lard. It is necessary to achieve such a consistency that a chicken egg dipped in brine floats and does not sink. Lard is placed in the brine and pressed down with a weight. It is left for 2-3 weeks, after which it is taken out and soaked in ordinary water for another day.
- The dry salting method is faster. It allows you to prepare lard in 3 days. For 1 kg of product, prepare a mixture of 4 tsp of salt, as well as one tsp. red and black pepper. A spoonful of tomato paste or juice is added to the mixture to obtain a well-adhering slurry, with which all the pieces are coated. The lard is placed in the refrigerator for 3 days, after which it is taken out and washed to remove excess coating.
- If you don’t want to wait several days or weeks, you can simply boil the lard in salt water with the addition of various spices. Coriander, peppercorns, cloves, dill seeds, etc. are used. In this case, the smoking time will be shorter.
