The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1877-12-03
THE PRESS.
FARM AND HOUSEHOLD.
COru.Red Pork.


The opinion is quite general, if not uuiver-
sal, that corn-fed pork is harder, contains
more nutrimeut. and shrinks less in the pot
and in the irving pan, than pork fed on milk,
slops. or partly on flesh, as happens where
swine are kept and fed in slaughter yards,
and the food of which is more or less the of.
fall Of slaughtered animals. Nevertheless the
opinion is almost wholly an erroneous one, as
we shall try to show. Granted that under a
temperature so low that lard remains firm
and stiff, corn-fed pork is firmer than pork
fed on milk, Stops or flesh, but this firmness
depends On the relatively large amount of
stearlne than OF oleine in the composition of
the fatty matter of corn-fed pork; but it is a
firmness which is wholly lost at high temp
erature, like that of Summer heat, or the av-
erage of tropical weather. Where pork is
made partly on milk, Stops or similar food,
the oleine of the fat exceeds in quantity the
stearlne, and while the meat so made may at
ordinary temperaturelappear soft and flabby,it
really contains more nutriment-that is,
more albuminous matter-and will shrink
less in cooking than corn-fed pork, the cell
tissues which envelop the fatty matter are
very thin and light, and consequently tender,
and when heat is applied, either by boiling or
frying, the cells burst, the lard escapes, and
the fieshy portion shrinks to almost nothing.
And this happens because corn is very de-
HclenI III the substance Wnlcn MAKE cell us
sue-that is, in albuminous matter. On the
contrary. milk and Stops are very rich in al.
luminous matter, and flesh is almost wholly
composed of it, and consequently swine fed
and fattened on these substances have cell
tissue largely developed, and where the lard
escapes in cooking there is much larger
portion of solid meat left. In the old coun-
try, where swine are raised and fattened on
peas and barley and the like, and where such
a thing as an exclusive corn diet is almost
unknown, cooks make a great account of
Harding is, cutting the fatty part of
pork into long, narrow strips, and sewing
them into certain meats and game birds prev
ious to cooking for the purpose of increasing
their flavor and juices. With the ordinary
"larding in the United States is much re-
stricted or gone out of fashion. In the case
of foreign pork, its abundance and strength
of cell tissues make it suitable for the opera
ton, in the other, the delicacy and tender
ness of the substance render it quite unfit for
that purpose. AS for Illustration of how par
tcular kinds of food affect adipose and cell
tissues, it may be stated that the meat of
hogs fatted on beach nuts and "mast" gen.
orally, so far as the fat is concerned, is semi
transparent; and slaughtered hog hung by
the heels, will drip lard-oil from the snout at
an ordinary temperature. In candle burning
days, the farmers and jewellers of the Middle
States learned that.the tallow of grass-fatted
beeves would make candles which would not
run in midsummer; but the tallow of corn
fatted cattle required to be hardened by the
addition of alum, rosin, or some other sub.
stance.-Cor. Country Gentleman.