I agree - without a doubt it makes the best pastry
I use it for roast spuds too.

Why? It has a low smoke point, you would be better off using sunflower oil which has a high smoke point. Lard also has a high smoke point (as long as its clean, dirty fat lowers the smoke point)

Olive oil is fine provided you add a little butter - would never fry with lard but echo the half and half lard and butter for shortcrust pastry - best texture possible and you can taste the butter.

Not the healthiest option perhaps - but a little of what you fancy ......

Butter also has a low smoke point, better to combine an oil with a high smoke point. Olive oil in frying can develop odd flavours if used at too high a temp.

I agree I just cant replicate the taste with sunflower oil, and Yorkies rise best with lard.

I agree with that, I love chips and roasties cooked in lard or dripping

there's a restaurant/hotel call the Three Acres in Huddersfield, Yorks. They cook their chips in beef fat. OMG. Lovely.

I hate eating food cooked in lard; my gran still uses the stuff (even though she denies it), and you always know she has, as if there's leftovers you can see the whites patches!

Me mum always cooked chips in lard! She had one of these big green electric bottom saucepans.she kept it specially for chips ! They were gorgeous......all my cousins used to come round for their Aunts egg & chips! Awwww

What?!!! This is news to me - can you point me to a source?

Certainly:

http://www.hdlighthouse.org/treatmen...es/1161hne.php

http://www.mercola.com/2003/oct/15/cooking_oil.htm

http://foodpark.blogspot.com/2007/07...ing-temps.html

and plenty more.

My nan always cooks with Lard

(re Trex)

You daft sod. Funny, though.

No. Lard is so heavily processed these days, it tastes very little different from sunflower/rapseed oil. You could try groundnut or olive?

Rapeseed oil is supposed to be the best oil to use, least in monounsaturates, well that's what I've read, I may be wrong.

You are:

http://www.bhawkindustries.com/blank...=0&prodstart=0

http://www.westonaprice.org/knowyourfats/conola.html

Yes - but the problem here seems to be heating to high temperatures either for a long period of time or using the same oil over and over again. Frying say an egg in oil for a minute or gently frying some onion for spag bol will not make the meal toxic. I'd be more worried about the chip shop where the oil will be on the go all day. Or at least that is my understanding of it.

If I've got Radio 2 on in the evening I often cook with Mark Radcliffe, but sadly no longer with Lard.





On topic - best chips I've tasted were cooked with beef fat - that was in Cleethorpes about 20 years ago.

Way back then, the fat that McDonalds used to cook their fries in contained a proportion of beef fat (dripping).