Charcuterie: Part Deux

Yesterday, I introduced you to charcuterie.  Here is an account of our second day of charcuterie.  We made so many patés, patés en croute, sausages, rillettes, and other things I can't even spell that I hardly remember all their names.  Despite the lack of nomenclature, I hope you enjoy the photos.

This fat infused meat is headed for the vat of oil and garniture aromatique you see below.

Where it will cook until tender.

Later, people will rush to eat the pork before there is none left.

This is fat and onions with a bit of water for good measure, which will cook slowly throughout class.  It will later become part of the boudin noir sausages.  What exactly is a boudin noir sausage, you ask? Well...

It's blood sausage.  Yes, that is the pork's blood (I told you nothing was spared from a pig).  And, yes, that is the chef taking a spoon, dipping it in the blood and tasting it.  Why, those of you who haven't fainted and are still reading might ask?  To test its saltiness, of course.  Only amateurs don't do that.

With the largest ladle I have ever seen, he took the blood and poured it into the onion/fat mixture we cooked.

Et voila.

Again, he takes the ridiculously large ladle and dumps the sausage mixture into the casing.

Which instantly fills with the blood sausage.

And he ties it off to make the individual links until he ties one too tight and oops!  He seems undeterred and just forges ahead, making his links.  Kyoko, who was only about a milimeter away from being totally covered in uncooked blood sausage was not quite as undeterred as the chef.

Cooked and ready to eat. 

Moving on to paté.  We mixed together ground pork with seasonings and an egg.

And formed it into this pan before popping it into an oven to bake.

Next, we made liver paté.

The livers are blended in a large food processor.

A scoop of this aromatic milk is added.

And the color and taste change.

Into the moulds it goes to be baked.

More pork is ground using this small machine.

If we had an industry size amount of pork to grind we could use this machine, which I refer to as an arm taker-offer.  It's so big and powerful that if you stuck your hand in there, it would surely rip your arm off and no one wants your arm in their sausage, so please don't do that.

Once ground, we mixed the meat with some sautéed mushrooms to make boudin blanc.

And then we cooked them in water.

The chef pounding out dough for his paté en croute.

He lines the mould with the dough and then places the paté inside.

And he decorates it beautifully.  For some reason, it never ceases to amaze me when grown French men who seem quite brusque produce such delicate work.

As we wait for everything to bake, Isabelle decides to pass the time by taking her temperature.

Beautifully browned and baked, the patés are ready.  Bon Appetit!