Swine Fear Me

Just for a little while, to counter the ignorance that is apparently damaging the American pork industry:

Swine Fear Me

Feel free to toss in your thoughts or any links to posts about cooking pork for the next week or so, and then it will be back to normal. Normal being feel free to toss in your thoughts or any links to posts about cooking any meat, in case that had not been clear. We will return to our regularly scheduled Fish Fear Me shortly, since this weekend is the holy day of Fishing Opener here in MN and I hope to have some posts on that. However, my plans for that are up in the air at the moment, since Sunday is also Mother's Day and there's some issue at this point about when and what we are doing for her. And yes, Mom takes priority over fishing opener. Give me any shit you want over that, I'm ready.

(Inspired by Rob, unless you think it's goofy...then it's all on me)

Comments

[Rob]

I've commented here on how I like pork chops (Thin and pan-fried to a tasty crisp) but I thought I'd mention a couple of ways many of your readers may not have tried. Boudin is a pork product made in southeast Louisiana mostly. There are two types; red and white. The red is also known as blood sausage and the reason is rather self-explanatory and maybe a little too graphic for the sensitive types. I eat both but prefer the white. Boudin is ground pork, some other pork by-products, and rice in a sausage skin. You can get it here either fresh or frozen but it's already cooked when you buy it so all you do is warm it up. You can do that any way you like. Some steam it, some grill it, and some just bake it in the oven. The trick is to warm it until it's just about to come out of the skin. It's similar to dirty rice but about 100 times better. I eat it with/on crackers.

Here's a link to the kind I usually buy: http://www.savoiesfoods.com/products_andouille.html

Andouille sausage is mentioned at the link as well. Andouille is also an excellent way to feed your pork addiction. It comes fresh or frozen but also fully-cooked when you buy it just like boudin. Andouille is mainly used as a seasoning meat in red beans & rice, jambalaya, gumbo, and any number of other Cajun recipes or you can eat it on a po-boy.

[Rob]

About the link in the previous comment: Savoie's, to my knowledge, only sells the white boudin. The red sausage you see in the picture is Andouille. In fact, I'm not sure you can get red boudin anywhere but a handful of meat counters in Louisiana.

[Mr. Bingley]

Pulled pork and pork chops, yum yum yum.

[Dave E.]

I'm not familiar with boudin, but I've heard of andouille. Just two more reasons for a trip to Louisiana.

[Dave E.]

Mr. B.-Oh yes.

[Kate P]

Dude. Because my aunt who is coming from Mexico City will be at my parents' house on Saturday for a visiting family/Mothers' Day/my sister's b-day cookout, my brother e-mailed my mom to tell her that he and his family won't be there. I kinda get it, they have a one year old, but I just have a really hard time believing that there's any threat when they're letting my aunt's plane land in the U.S. and not, say, sticking her in quarantine.

I told my mom I was feeling reckless. I'll be there and let's put bacon on everything.

Pork chops are awesome. I could eat them fixed just about any way. And speaking of Mexico--I ate my share of crispy fried pork rinds there at my uncle's relatives' house when I was there.

Hey, my mom said she wanted to do her crossword puzzle in peace on Sunday--maybe I should go fishing!

[Dave E.]

Fly on up, Kate. I'll take you fishing on the Pike River this weekend.

[Dave E.]

Oh, and Kate? If your aunt had cold symptoms I would probably feel the same way as your brother. If she doesn't though, then I don't think I would have a problem bringing a baby as long as he/she doesn't have any underlying health issues. This strain of flu actually doesn't seem any more harmful as any other at this point.

[Mr. Bingley]

*If* it's not too rainy on Saturday, and since we've had rain for 100 straight days I'm not that hopeful, I think I'll make some pork ribs.

[Dave E.]

Yeah, I just came across an ad for a local store that has a buy one get one free special now on pork ribs. I think I'll bring those up north this weekend.