Tallow was once used by McDonald's to cook their fries. Today, it's almost all but vanished from the public knowledge. Tallow is to beef what lard is to pork, and it's just a product of nose-to-tail use of an animal. Along with it's culinary use, tallow can also be used for soldering, leather manufacturing and soap making. If you plan to use it for cooking, try to get beef fat from organically-raised cows since many toxins tend to collect in the fat of the animal.
Ingredients
- 3 lbs beef fat, trimmed of any meat
Directions
- Heat your oven to 250 degrees F.
- Cut the beef fat into very small pieces or chop fine in a food processor.
- Place the chopped fat into a dutch oven, cover and bake in the oven for 3–4 hours.
- After 90 minutes, stir the fat in the pot to ensure it isn't sticking to the bottom of the pan. Every 30–45 minutes from then on, stir and loosen the fat from the pot.
- Once the fat begins to brown and a lot of the fat has melted into the bottom of the pot, remove the dutch oven from the oven, strain out the brown cracklins and allow both to cool.
- Discard the cracklins, place the rendered fat into a container and refrigerate.
- Use as a deep fry oil or regular pan-frying oil.
Makes 8–10 ounces.
adapted from: Mark's Daily Apple
