Ok this was fascinating, for me at least. Just when i thought that i knew all the nose to tail tricks of the matanza in order to use every scrap of the animal, my mum tells me of a new one. Believe is or not, they even found a way to use the membrane that contains the intestines of the pig; the “farajullas” of the title of this post. Click on the film below for the full explanation:
other foody posts on this blog:
further adventures in foraging
Posted in documentary, film, food, recipe, spain
Tagged farajullas, food, galicia, matanza, nose to tail eating, recipe, spain
warning: this post is most definitely not vegetarian friendly, nor is it for the squeamish…YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!!
i have blogged about morcilla and the matanza before.
But i have never been quite so directly involved…. One of our pigs was due to be killed. Normally they are taken to the butcher for this but because we wanted to make morcilla or black pudding, the butcher came here to kill it so we could collect the blood, then the animal is taken to the butchers.
So how do i write this…it was a strange, uncomfortable, surreal experience for me…I found myself in the dark on a stormy night watching the animal being killed. The pig is stunned first with an electronic gun, but of course when its throat is cut it struggles. The butcher asks me to hold one of his legs, to stop it from hurting my mum who is collecting the blood (yes i know how this sounds)…
I am a little shocked, i was already a little freaked out by the process, i did not expect to be so involved. However i do strongly believe that if you eat it, if you cook it and eat it…you need to be able to deal with where it came from. I am shocked, the pigs leg feels warm (of course), almost human. I close my eyes hold on tight and wait for it to stop twitching.
The butcher i must say, did the job by himself that once took 4 men to do, he did it all so quickly and efficiently and without fuss that it was as “humane” as it could possible be for the animal given the circumstances. BUT it is shocking, no doubt about it …The blood meanwhile needs to be stirred constantly in one direction the second it hits the pan. The pan already contains water and a peeled raw onion, anti-coagulants apparently and you need to keep stirring till it cools down completely. i stir away for half an hour or so.
So now that the main ingredient has been gathered, the morcilla can be made. For the full recipe see here. Once all the dried fruit, flour, spices and bread has been added to the blood it is still surprisingly liquid, but it will set during the cooking process. Next the skins of the large intestine are filled with the mixture. You must be careful not to over fill them…
(My photos of this process looked so gory that i went outside and photographed through the window to “dampen” the effect a little!)
The puddings are then boiled – this is a very delicate process as if the skins burst at this point, you lose the whole pudding. They must be suspended in a large pan and must not touch the bottom (again see here for details) and the water must be kept only just boiling.
The puddings will take anything from 45 mins to 1 hour 30 mins depending on the thickness. You test them by pinching them with a sewing needle. If no liquid emerges, the pudding is cooked…
If you are lucky enough to have a lareira – an open fire place common to traditional galician houses that is ideal for smoking and curing, you can hang the puddings there for a few days, otherwise hang them somewhere dry and well ventilated. In a few days the puddings will be ready to be sliced and fried and they also freeze beautifully…
fried morcilla – you can see the pine nuts and pieces of figs in the slices…i know it does not look pretty but it tastes divine, sweet, a little salty, a little crispy on the outside and smooth in the middle…
other foody posts on this blog:
further adventures in foraging
So now for some posts from Galicia…rainy, rainy Galicia…so expect a lot of foody posts…
A favourite Spanish breakfast of churros - ridged fried donuts, specially designed to hold as much of the thick hot chocolate it is dunked into. In the cities it’s the choice of party goers to end their festivities in a bar with chocolate y churros before finally going to bed.
Here is how to make it:
you need 250 gms of plain flour and 250 ccs of boiling water plus a pinch of salt. Add the flour to the slightly salty boiling water and mix.
The mixture should be very, very stiff, almost to the point of being too stiff to beat. Then fill a piping bag with a star nozzle (to create the signature ridges)and pipe out the fingers of churros.
Deep fry in a light oil till golden and crispy, remove and sprinkle with sugar. Makes enough for 4 people.
Make the chocolate using tablet chocolate and milk. Traditionally it should be dense enough to leave a thick coating on the crispy ridged churros.
Then dunk away…
other foody posts on this blog:
further adventures in foraging
Tagged chocoalate, churros, food, fried donut, hot chocolate, recipe, spain, spanish, spanish breakfast
When in Galicia, the subject of food often comes to mind…
The simple and extremely delicious empanada: a classic Spanish staple…a pie consisting of bread dough with a sweet onion and paprika filling that can be augmented with tuna, meat, salt cod…Most households round here used to make it once a week in the wood oven (when the household made their bread for the week). But you still can find empanadas for sale in pretty much every bakery. Its pretty easy to make yourself though…
To make it you need: (no amounts here, just judge it by how big you want to make the pie – but you will always need a LOT of onions…)
Some good simple white bread dough
Onions
Red pepper
Tuna (or any kind of left over meat, or salt cod)
Olive oil
Sweet paprika
For the filling: (can be done the night before)
You need to chop a lot of onions and a small amount of red pepper (the onion mixture should just be flecked with the occasional red pepper). Put them in a large frying pan with plenty of olive oil (almost cover them) and cook slowly over a low heat. Do not fry them quickly, we want the onions to sweat and become transparent, absolutely NOT to become brown and crispy. When the onions have become transparent but not mushy, season with salt to taste and add plenty of Spanish sweet paprika. (please not NO garlic or pepper – it does not need it). They should look like this:
On a side note:
Don’t let any Johnny-come-lately tell you Hungarian paprika is the best!!! Spanish Paprika wins every time, it is much sweeter than its Hungarian counterpart and in my opinion has a much better flavour and an incredibly vibrant colour…
This onion mixture forms the basis for your filling…
Next roll our the base of your pie according to the size of your baking tray/dish, which you will have already oiled liberally with some of the paprika red oil from the precooked onions.
Once the dough has lined your dish, spread a generous layer of the onions, then add some tuna, or precooked meat etc…
(here we used some salt cod and raisins)
Then add another rolled out piece of dough and seal the edges. Cut a hole in the middle to let the steam out, and paint the dough with more of the red oil from the onions.
Place in a very hot oven for 15-20 minutes and then lower the temperature and cook till the pie is nice and crisp, if necessary, flip the pie over to crispen up the base too.
Sweet onions, salty fish, crispy bread crust, really simple and really good…empanada is great freshly made, but also really good at room temperature and it’s great for picnics…
other foody posts on this blog:
further adventures in foraging
We have a blog for this event i am working on :
http://methodsprocessesofchange.wordpress.com
It is worth looking at as we have writers, journalists, illustrators, film maker (well me….) all contributing, and it is updated a lot throughout the day.
So Thursday was a little chaotic as all first days are, i had technical nightmares including my editing software programme failing on me, and then when i resolved that, my (very expensive) video camera completely broke down, kind of a problem considering i am in charge of video at this workshop….and then the other girl who is supposed to film the entire event managed to arrive…without her video camera.. Still managed to get stuff done though…
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Food is a big part of the workshop programmme, was is today’s dunner menu:
Dinner 20th – SUD SUD SUD!
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Rosanna proposes:
the tradition of Southern Italy, simple food from a humble land: bread products – “pucce” (small breads with olives and vegetables) to be eaten with tomatoes, rocket and tuna, “pittule e cottu” (small fried bread balls with vine molasses), dried tomato soup, “pitta de mennule” (almond cake). Sweet bread for the breakfast of 21st.
Bread making with “pasta madre” during the afternoon, open to participants – the original technique of leavening, the transformation of flour into bread and more.
It was very very good!
here is rosanna making pittule:
Posted in art, documentary, film, food, photographic, recipe
Tagged art conference, biella, fondazione pistoletto, methods processes of change, pitta de mennule, pittule, pucce, recipe
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