Monday, January 11, 2010

New Meat Products 2010

Announcing two new meat products for us in 2010!
First we have fennel scented Italian style lamb sausage along with lamb sausage with sage (informally known as breakfast sausage). Our butcher has packaged them in links-4 to a package. Most packages weigh a bit over 1 pound. They come frozen and vacuum sealed in cryovac. The Italian sausage can be used in any recipe one would use pork sausage: in pasta sauce, grilled, casseroles-same goes for the breakfast style sausage.
Below are two fun examples:

Italian lamb sausage sauteed with boneless chicken thighs,



sauteed mushrooms, onions and garlic-add to some spaghetti sauce-slow simmered for a couple hours like a mock cacciatore and then served with some spinach linguine.



I like the yin and yang of the linguine in the photo!




Second, we have thin sliced pork cutlets. Perfect for frying up breaded like schnitzel, stir fry or piccata. Or put into sandwiches as in Cuban style with pickles! Or maybe pork stroganoff. Here I decided to make pork in a schnitzel style. First when frying you want to use mise en place technique, or literally translated from the French, 'put in place', in order to have everything right in front of you and ready to go. Things can happen quickly and having everything prepared or chopped and available ensures a fool proof frying session.
Here are several vessels to hold my ingredients. This time I used a bowl, casserole dish and a pot. You can use anything you have. I began by drying the pork cutlets, pounding flatter in between two layers of wax paper


coating in flour, then beaten egg, then breadcrumbs.





When I get going on a roll, I must remind myself of the frying technique-one hand does the egg, the other hand does the breadcrumbs. What not to do is this: popsicle fingers! If using both hands in both bowls, the popsicle fingers can build and build until............


After coating all pieces of meat, I let the cutlets sit for a bit to firm up before frying.

Using canola oil at about 350 degrees in a skillet, then just fry 'em all up! Drain on towels. Salt and pepper to taste.

We gobbled them up with some steamed broccoli and lemon wedges.
We hope you enjoy these new meat products and we will have them at each farmers market we attend as well as special order at the farm by appointment.