I've been wanting to experiment with lard in a couple of bakery recipes and see how it improves the finished product. I can get regular lard, but am unsure as to where to get leaf lard. There is a mexican market in Giddings, thought that might be worth a try. Anybody use it? Any ideas on where to find it other than online? I'm between Brenham and Giddings.

I musta missed the day they covered leaf lard in Animal Science. but I can tell ya flavor and texture wise regular lard in pie crust and in tamale masa or nixtamal, there is nothing better (IMHO).

Hope you find it & let us know how it worked out for you.

You might be best ordering online. I haven't seen it anywhere.

quote:

---

I musta missed the day they covered leaf lard in Animal Science. but I can tell ya flavor and texture wise regular lard in pie crust and in tamale masa or nixtamal, there is nothing better (IMHO).

---

leaf lard is the Cadillac of lards; taken from around the kidneys (only) and not mixed with other fats (backfat or caul). It takes what you've stated above to yet another level.

It ain't cheap. As stated above, best bet $ wise is to get it online. Cheapest I've found it is at Heritage Foods. If you gotta buy it in person, only place I know of in Texas is in Austin http://daidueaustin.net/butcher-shop/weeklymenu/

Aggies mentioned in the article below (perhaps you know the good Dr.) about a third of the way down and lots of info on leaf lard and where to get it:
http://www.themeaningofpie.com/2012/08/leaf-lard/

Section on A&M:
"BBQ camp is held in the Meat Sciences Department of Texas A&M in college station. Therefore, I was surrounded not only by meat experts but by the very nature of meat sciences, fat experts. Professor Jeff Savell was kind enough to field my questions about pork fat and leaf lard and in an act of utter generosity and kindness, offered to save the leaf fat from the summer slaughter for me. Bear in mind, A&M teaches very astute young men and women every aspect of meat production, grading, and safety. That means that animals are killed, and prepared as they would be at any other meat facility, but under the watchful eyes of a bunch of PhDs and graduate students (thank you, Leslie Frenzel). Meaning, I got some really great fat. A week or so ago, I found the best gift on my doorstep, a frozen delivery of pure leaf fat. Daniel will be taking half of this bounty, too."

Never know what you'll find out there giving Aggies props

Call the Rosenthal meat science center and see if they have any left. We just had pork slaughter a couple weeks ago.

Called after biz hours; no VM. Will call in the morning.

When I took meat science under Dr. Gary Smith, Jeff Savell was around. I think he was a tech in our class then. That was 38 years ago.

The subject matter always referred to "KPH" fat (kidney, pelvic, and heart fat). I wonder if this is the fat used for Leaf Lard or is it strictly kidney as stated in the link?

Allen; everything I've been reading is that leaf lard is from around the kidneys only. Therefore, expensive but apparently worth it if you're baking pies or biscuits. My wife has been looking for it for a while for her pies. I like to make the wife happy... lol. Anyways, I hope the article helped. I'm learning a lot about fat these days.

Wow, that would definitely make it fairly hard to get.

Just looking at it, the KPH all looks pretty similar....it is kind of "lumpy" and definitely a different texture than regular fat.

I guess that around the kidney has a different taste/smell than that around the pelvic and heart area. I doubt you could tell the difference until maybe you actually baked with it.