Rendered Animal Fat Recipe
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Save your trimmings! Freeze them, and when you have at least a pound, render them into liquid gold to paint steaks, make Yorkshire pudding, fry potatoes, and make pie crusts. One pound of solid fat yields about 1 pint (2 cups) of rendered fat, and you can double or triple the recipe as needed.
Makes:
2 cupsTakes:
Ingredients
- 1 pound animal fat
Metric conversion:
These recipes were created in US Customary measurements and the conversion to metric is being done by calculations. They should be accurate, but it is possible there could be an error. If you find one, please let us know in the comments at the bottom of the page
Method
- Collect. Trim the fat from your brisket, prime rib, pork butt, or peel off the skins from poultry. Or just ring the bell at the butcher counter and ask for trimmings. Many will give you whatever you want for free. Chop up chunks about 1 to 2-inches square. You don’t need to be precise. If there’s a little meat attached, that’s OK. Don’t grind it as some people recommend. You can freeze it for when you are ready to render.
- Render. Most animal fats begin to liquefy, a.k.a. render, at about 130°F. You don’t want to render your fat too hot or it will extract flavors from any remaining meat and darken the fat. Many people render fats in pans or pots on top of the stove. It smells funky, so you might want to do this outdoors on your grill’s side burner or on a gas grill. You can also render fat in your grill or smoker next time you are doing a long, low and slow cook of ribs, brisket or pulled pork. You will get a bonus, smoky fat. Just put the chunks in a Dutch oven or a pan in the pit in the indirect zone and stir every 30 minutes or so. If you don’t want smoke flavor, cover it. It is easiest to control the temperature in a Dutch oven in your oven, or in a slow cooker. Either way, place your collected fat in a Dutch oven and, to prevent burning, add enough water to come about halfway up the fat. Place the pot on a burner set for medium heat or in an oven, smoker or grill set to 225°F or 250°F. Let it boil, lid off, stirring frequently with a wooden spoon to make sure it doesn’t stick to the bottom, until the water boils away, anywhere from 3 to 6 hours. Check it regularly. When the water is gone and you can see that the fat is what is left boiling in the pot, turn the heat to low (or keep a steady 225ºF temperature in a smoker or oven). You can stop now and pour off the fat, or let it go a bit longer until it fries the remaining meat and connective tissue.
- Clarify. When you have a pot full of golden liquid, scoop out and discard the solids. Pour the liquid through a fine mesh strainer or cheesecloth into a clean jar, screw on the lid, and refrigerate or freeze for months. Sometimes there will be cracklins and fried meat left behind that will beg to be munched on while watching the game. Or chop them up and sprinkle them on a salad or pasta dish.