Pork

Length: < 1 min The “old friend” is the team at Pitt Cue who, after closing towards the end of last year at their tiny old crib in Soho (where you were rubbing body parts with others if the head-count went over 20), have… Read More »Mangalitza goodness & an old friend returns…

Length: < 1 min There’s a huge, long, involved, possibly even scholarly, post waiting to be written with this as the (click-bait) title. This one isn’t that post. But it is a subject that I’ll come back to later, worry not dear friends. No, this… Read More »Are pigs religious?

Length: < 1 min Yup; pretty sure I have – on numerous occasions. And this book, which I’ve mentioned before and will keep coming back to, agrees with me: Here’s their take on this weekend’s The Middle White:

Length: 4 mins I was reminded by this piece that I’d somehow failed to write up the history of the Middle White breed. Quite how I forgot I have no idea — but anyway, here we go. Let’s start the story first though with the now… Read More »Which one do you want then? The white one, in the middle…

Length: < 1 min Either that or it finds itself regularly running at a wall. Here’s the Middle White. Now this breed, unlike the rather bland, Large White, is a pig I quite admire and one whose flavour is well worth searching out. But, I’m… Read More »This nose looks like it resulted from a collision with a tank…

Length: < 1 min This is a list of those breeds officially designated a pedigree and/or rare (or even in some cases unfortunately, endangered, depending on the number still left) by those very nice people at the British Pig Association — they do a great… Read More »“You don’t see many of those around here, do you”?

Length: < 1 min Just months after “Big Pork” said it couldn’t be done, US company, Tyson is raising up to a million pigs without antibiotics…   The US, even more than over here, really does factory farming. Horrible conditions for the pigs whilst… Read More »A great start: no growth hormones, antibiotics or gestation crate use.

Length: < 1 min An Observer piece (today: 21st Feb ’16) on pig farmer Richard Vaughan whose Huntsham Farm supplies Simon Rogan’s “l’enclume” with Middle White pork is well worth a read. Note how long he hangs even just the “usual” pork he supplies— for 13 days,… Read More »Hang that pig! OK, but for how long?

Length: 6 mins To be honest, I’m not sure there’s an easy answer to this one… Like the (upcoming) Tools Of The Trade post, this is another area where you could spend huge amounts of folding stuff. That said, I don’t think my… Read More »How many food books does one person need? I mean really?

Length: < 1 min

Length: 4 mins I don’t apologise for the pun although it actually isn’t mine — I wish it were. The first time I can find that it was used in a culinary context was from this piece: a wonderful illustrated masterclass guide to Pierre… Read More »The platter of tiny feet

Length: 6 mins Indeed, almost the exact opposite of the Sisyphean task but let’s not waste anymore time… Puns all done? OK then, on with the show: BBC Radio 4’s “Farming Today” had a short piece last week (Feb ’16) on a Yorkshire… Read More »It’s all downhill on the subject of swill now…

Length: < 1 min A quick update here, as this was something I’d missed from earlier in the week, when writing my earlier posts: French supermarkets banned from throwing away and spoiling unsold food ‘Supermarkets will be obliged to sign a donation deal with… Read More »Well done France! Supermarket waste reigned in…

Length: 7 mins Back so soon? Excellent — great to see you visiting here again. In Part 2, I’ll be revisiting boars and their descendants (the pig we all know & love today), touching some more on their history, their diet & their… Read More »Still not boared?

Length: 7 mins This isn’t totally about Sus scrofa (otherwise famous as the Wild Boar) but as they’re the common ancestor of nearly all domesticated pigs it seems a good time to give some background on these still extant, fascinating animals. This longer article… Read More »Am I boaring you? Part 1 of 2

Length: < 1 min Thanks to a review today in the Observer by the always readable (and fellow pig enthusiast) Jay Rayner, I am reminded of this Parisian classic restaurant, directly opposite Les Halles. It claims never to have closed since it first opened… Read More »Pig parts is pork paradise at “Au Pied de Cochon”

Length: 4 mins Pigs have had some really bad press over the years. And after reading this piece,  I think you’ll agree that they’ve been pretty hard done by up until now, by the ladies and gentlemen of the press? And that needs to… Read More »The 4th estate really needs to up their game & get with the pig program!

Length: 2 mins Today’s Radio 4’s “The Kitchen Cabinet” (which is nearly always worth a listen) was focused on the science behind the tastes in cooking, with the bulk of the discussion centred around “umami“. [NOTE: There’s a whole page here on umami… Read More »Umami or “mouthfulness”…

Length: < 1 min Or, at the least, in the case of the pig, it’s the fatal one. Quickly severing the carotid, the erupting blood caught for use later in black-pudding or similar, this ensures a (comparatively) quick and painless death — although not… Read More »The first cut is the deepest.

Length: < 1 min It’s going to be an exciting pork year here at Salute The Pig Central. I’ll be adding a lot more more short-form items to this blog in preparation for another (still top-secret) project that we’re working on but will also… Read More »Happy New Year & a porktious 2016