For eight years after we married, we lived next door to my husband’s parents in a yard which was also used by the blacksmith to carry out his trade.
My father in law kept pigs at the top of his garden and always contrived to have one slaughtered in time for us to make pork pies for Christmas.
On the day the butcher arrived with the humane gun I was obliged to take the children out of the way as the proceedings would be too upsetting for them, but aft the pig was killed, cleaned and hung on a stout iron hook fixed in the ceiling of the scullery kitchen, they didn’t seem to mind at all.
After the pig was joined by the butcher, the hams and pieces of bacon were rubbed in salt – petre, wrapped in muslin and hung in my brother in laws cold cellar. Now came the part I liked best, making the pork pies. We all worked together and pared all the pieces of park away from the larger bones, placed this meat in large pans with tight fitting lids, which were then placed on the fire to cook slowly. The bones were then sawn into small pieces and cooked in a similar way.
I was allocated the task of making the pastry for the pies, which were made in loose bottomed tins. They were baked in the oven of a large, coal-burning Yorkshire Range. Controlling the temperature was a very tricky business!
Finally, the moment arrived to take the pies from the oven and place them on cooling trays. They were a delicious sight, all golden brown and shiny and through the tiny slits in their antres’ rose puffs of steam which filled the kitchen with a most savoury aroma.
There was nothing which could compare with that delicious smell, it made our mouths water in anticipation.
Nothing was wasted on the pig, the rib bones were made into spare-rib pies, the fat was cut into small pieces and rendered down to make pork dripping, the pieces of cooked and cooled fat were sprinkled with salt, to be eaten with relish; we called these scraps. The checks were roasted, the rest of the face was cooked and cooled, then the meat was picked off and made into brawn, the feet or “trotters” were stewed, they were delicious. The liver, kidneys and heart were cut into strips and a piece of each was placed on a plate, covered with a piece of leaf fat and distributed fairly to everyone who had brough scraps of waste food, potato peelings, etc; which had helped in the making of the pigs food.
Even the bladder was washed and filled with air, ready to be used as a football by the children who came to play in the yard.
How true is the old saying ‘You can every part of a pig except its squeak’?
