SC - potted meat

[LrdRas at aol.com]

In a message dated 12/30/99 9:23:47 AM Eastern Standard Time, 
alm4 at cornell.edu writes:

<< I have never heard that term before, what is potted meat?
 
    Angeline >>

Here are 3 recipes I have. The first is a Pennsylvania Dutch one which would 
be suitable for your purposes. The second is a lengthier way of preserving 
meat and the source of the colloquial phrase 'scraping the bottom of the 
barrel'. Enjoy! :-) The 3rd one is a lengthy procedure also but  is done in 
the tradition of the Languedoc region.

Potted Meat 
(Made from cooked soup bone and veal shin)

2 1/2 cups stock        1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
2 cups boiled meat (heaping)    Salt and pepper to taste
1 1/2 tablespoons sage      2 hard-boiled eggs
1 grated nutmeg         1 teaspoon parsley (chopped)
1/3 teaspoon cinnamon

Put the juice and meat and seasoning in a pan and cook for 10 minutes. The 
chop up the hard-boiled eggs and parsley together. Take a wet mold, put in 
meat, then layer of the egg and parsley and then meat again until mold is 
full. Put away to cool. 
...........................
This is how we used to do it...

 Meat potting is preserving meat in it's own grease in a large crock pot. 
This is how we did it. Early in the morning Dad killed a pig and started 
cutting it up. He gave the pieces to Mom who had the wood stove in the 
kitchen hot and ready to cook. She started frying the pork and prepared the 
10 gallon crock pot. This pot was about 18 inches in diameter and 24 inches 
deep. Mother washed it, and got it just as clean as she could get it. As the 
pork fried, it gave off lots of grease. She took some of this very hot grease 
and poured it into the bottom of the crock, sealing and sterilizing the 
bottom. Then she put the meat she had just finished cooking down onto this 
grease.

As she continued to cook throughout the day she added the well fried meat and 
covered it with the hot fat that came from the cooking process. By the 
evening the pig was all fried up and in the pot, covered over with a nice 
layer of lard that had hardened. As the days passed by, we dug down into the 
lard to where the meat was, pulled out what we needed, and put it in the 
frying pan. We cooked it good a second time to kill any bacteria that could 
have possibly gotten into it. Doing this not only sterilized the meat for 
eating, but melted off all the excess fat. The meat was taken out of the pan 
and the fat was poured back into the pot to seal up the hole we had just made 
getting the meat out. -Gordon Schaufertre. copyright © Al Durtschi
...........................

Lou Pastis En Pott 
(Potted Meat)

Ingredients (8 servings)
1/2 LB Lard 
2 LB Lean beef 
2 LB Lean pork 
3 Bay leaves 
A few sprigs of thyme and rosemary 
1 ts Juniper berries 
Salt and pepper 
1/2 Bottle red wine (the near-black wine of Cabors or a Medoc)

Instructions
This is an unusual potted meat prepared only in the Languedoc. 
Serves 8 - 10 
Time: Start at least 2 weeks ahead; 30 minutes plus 2 hours cooking, repeated 
3 times 
First cooking: deep red Medoc) 
Second and third cooking: the same ingredients again each time 

You will need a large straight-sided earthenware pot. Scald the earthenware 
pot and grease it thoroughly with a little of the lard (you can line the 
bottom with a few fig or walnut leaves if you have them). Cut the beef and 
pork into slices, trimming the gristle and sinews as you do so. Put the bay 
leaves on the bottom of the pot. Lay in the meat slices, seasoning with the 
herbs, salt, and freshly ground pepper as you do so. Pour in the wine -- it 
should just cover the meat. 
Simmer the pot uncovered over a very low heat or in a preheated 250 deg F 
oven, for 1 1/2 to 2 hours, until the volume is reduced by half. Allow to 
cool. Seal with a layer of lard, melted and poured over the cool meat. Cover 
with wax paper tied down with string. Leave the pot on a refrigerator shelf 
for a week. Then remove the lard seal and add in another 2 lbs pork and 2 lbs 
beef, the whole covered with wine, seasoned and cooked as before. Repeat the 
operation at the end of another week. You will now have a delicious dark 
jelly-meat which you can either eat hot or cold. If you continue to replace 
the volume you have removed, the pot can go on forever. -From: THE OLD WORLD 
KITCHEN - THE RICH TRADITION OF EUROPEAN PEASANT COOKING" by Elisabeth Luard, 
ISBN 0-553-05219-5 

Ras


============================================================================

To be removed from the SCA-Cooks mailing list, please send a message to
Majordomo at Ansteorra.ORG with the message body of "unsubscribe SCA-Cooks".

============================================================================