Awards
Winner of The James Beard Cookbook of the Year 2009
Synopses & Reviews
An appealing exploration of the glories of cooking fat—a component of food that's newly fashionable—with history and recipes.
Duck fat. Caul fat. Leaf lard. Bacon. Ghee. Suet. Schmaltz. Cracklings. Jennifer McLagan knows and loves cooking fat, and you'll remember that you do too once you get a taste of her lusty, food-positive writing and sophisticated comfort-food recipes. Dive into more than 100 sweet and savory recipes using butter, pork fat, poultry fat, beef fat, and lamb fat, including Slow Roasted Pork Belly with Fennel and Rosemary, Risotto Milanese, Duck Rillettes, Bone Marrow Crostini, and Choux Paste Beignets. Scores of sidebars on the cultural, historical, and scientific facets of culinary fats as well as sumptuous food photos throughout make for a plump, juicy, satisfying read for food lovers. Reviews & Awards
James Beard Foundation Cookbook Award Finalist: Single Subject Category
IACP International Association of Culinary Professionals Cookbook Awards, Single Subject Category Finalist
"In Fat, Jennifer McLagan sets out to prove what our ancestors instinctively knew: that fat is good for you (not to mention delicious), and offers some science and history to back it up. But mostly Fat is a celebration of the stuff, with sidebars and recipes for everything from homemade butter to bacon mayonnaise."—New York Magazine"Fat isn't simply a cookbook: it's a celebration of the ingredient that makes everything we eat taste better."—Fine Cooking
“A smart, sensual celebration of the flavorful animal fats prized by chefs and shunned by a generation of lipo-phobes.”—People“Persuasively arguing that the never-ending quest for “health” has gone too far, McLagan's elegant and informed look at this most maligned ingredient is appropriately unctuous. . . . Her mixture of science, cultural anthropology and culinary imagination are intoxicating, making this a crucial work on the topic.” —Publishers Weekly *Starred Review* 7/21/08 Web Pick of the Week!
Synopsis
A rich and unapologetic celebration of this luscious food.
For all of history, minus the last thirty years, fat has been at the center of human diets and cultures. When scientists theorized a link between saturated fat and heart disease, industry, media, and government joined forces to label fat a greasy killer, best avoided. But according to Jennifer McLagan, not only is our fat phobia overwrought, it also hasn't benefited us in any way. Instead it has driven us into the arms of trans fats and refined carbohydrates, and fostered punitive, dreary attitudes toward food-that wellspring of life and pleasure.
In Fat, McLagan sets out with equal parts passion, scholarship, and appetite to win us back to a healthy relationship with animal fats. She starts by defusing fat's bad rap, both reminding us of what we already know-that fat is fundamental to the flavor of our food-and enlightening us with the many ways fat (yes, even animal fat) is indispensable to our health.
Mostly, though, Fat is about pleasures-the satisfactions of handling good ingredients skillfully, learning the cultural associations of these primal foodstuffs, recollecting and creating personal memories of beloved dishes, and gratifying the palate and the soul with fat's irreplaceable savor. Fat lavishes the reader with more than 100 recipes from simple to intricate, classic to contemporary, including:
- Butter-Poached Scallops
- Homemade Butter
- Carnitas
- Duck Confit
- Prosciutto-Wrapped Halibut with Sage Butter
- Steak and Kidney Pie
- Salted Butter Tart
Observing that though we now know everything about olive oil, we may not know what to do with lard or bone marrow, McLagan offers extensive guidance on sourcing, rendering, flavoring, using, and storing animal fats, whether butter or bacon, schmaltz or suet. Stories, lore, quotations, and tips touching on fat's place in the kitchen and in the larger culture round out this rich and unapologetic celebration of food at its very best.
Synopsis
McLagan knows and loves cooking fat, and offers more than 100 sweet and savory recipes that utilize this misunderstood ingredient. Sumptuous food photos throughout make for a satisfying read for food lovers.
About the Author
JENNIFER McLAGAN is a chef and sought-after food stylist and writer who has worked in London and Paris as well as her native Australia. Her first book,
Bones (2005), was widely acclaimed, winning the James Beard award for single subject food writing. She is a regular contributor to
Fine Cooking and
Food & Drink. She has lived in Toronto for more than twenty-seven years with her sculptor husband, Haralds Gaikis, with whom she escapes to Paris as often as possible. On both sides of the Atlantic, Jennifer maintains friendly relations with her butchers, who put aside their best fat and bones for her.
THE AUTHOR SCOOP
What was the hardest thing about writing a book?
Wondering if anyone other than your editor will read it.
Favorite cocktail?
Gin and tonic in the summer but it must be Hendricks with a slice of cucumber. In winter an Americano - red martini, campari, soda and a slice of lemon.
What food could you not live without?
Fat of course - all sorts of animal fat.
Name the most horrifying dish that your mother used to make.
Tripe in white sauce onions - I hated it. Now I love tripe but not in white sauce.
How did you learn to cook?
My first introduction was taking a course in French language. The course was taught by cooking French recipes written in French, so I have lots of food and cooking vocabulary.
Table of Contents
ContentsIntroduction: A Matter of Fat - 1
1 Butter: Worth It - 13
2 Pork Fat: The King - 67
3 Poultry Fat: Versatile and Good for You - 123
4 Beef and Lamb Fats: Overlooked but Tasty - 167
Bibliography - 219
Acknowledgments - 223
Index - 226