As a child, I remember well making potted meat with my Nana, using a pigs head, four pig’s feet and a couple of pound of shin, in total yielding about 4-5lb of high quality cooked meat.
This, in some of the better restaurants, is sometimes served as a terrine and with that label comes a measure of respectability (it’s all in the marketing, although there is also a move within the Artisan food sector toward using the less popular cuts like pig heads and feet, or lamb heads and feet).
The first barrier to this demand (small though it may be) is cost, as most slaughter houses don’t have the infrastructure or the skilled staff to process these products in order to comply with existing regulation.
The next issue after cost, is getting the product to market, as only a handful of consumers per retail outlet (be that butchers shop, farm shop or farmer’s market) will buy them.
After the supply and demand situation is resolved, what’s left is the age old problem of education, as the people who know what to do with these products, number not very many in my opinion.
These products take a little more preparation than there is in putting a pan of mince on or frying a steak, but the flavour and value of these under vastly used resources is immense and well worth the effort.
Because the head and feet are called by-products it makes them sound like MRM (mechanically recovered meat) which they most definitely are not. In fact, in the culinary culture of our continental cousins, these parts of the carcass are a much sought after delicacy and consequently, demand a value way above that which currently exists in the U.K. market.
If head and feet get the culinary recognition in this country they deserve, they will come to be appreciated for the marvellous food that they are and we'll have a couple less products to throw in the bin..... In itself fantastic, don't you think?
No comments:
Post a Comment