Leaf Land and Music

I have talked about my pie crust woes before. I am a fairly decent scratch baker-cakes, cookies, breads, even various candies and on and on. However, my pie crust is never as flakey and light as it should be. My mother thinks I work with it too much. It's gotten to where I just don't make pies because I refuse to use store bought pie crust. I love my boyfriend the Pillsbury Doughboy, but I am not buying his pie dough.

I always felt that lard made the best pie crusts. This was back in the day when people, especially in my rural neck of the woods used lard, or a mixture of lard and vegetable shortening to make pie crusts, but believe me, I always thought that the pie crusts made with lard were just so much flakier and had a better taste.

I was reading about leaf lard the other day, and now it seems to be following me around. I had never heard of leaf lard, the highest grade of lard, is obtained from the visceral fat around the kidney and around the loin. It has little pork flavoring and is therefore great for baked goods, in particular pie crust.

Now, I am a vegetarian and I have been for years; not a vegan mind you, but a vegetarian. I eat eggs and dairy products, but no meat, chicken or fish. I also am not a fan of items mad with meat products when I can avoid it. Leaf lard is not something that I would use now, but I find it so interesting. Here are some articles and blog posts about this wonder ingredient: here, here, and one of my new favorite blogs-Art of the Pie.

And now for some upcoming music festivals for in the DC area.

The 15th annual The Kennedy Center Mary Lou Williams Women in Jazz Festival is this weekend (May 20-22) and the DC Jazz Festival formerly the Duke Ellington Jazz Festival is June 1-13, 2010.

Have a nice week.

"The only real stumbling block is fear of failure. In cooking you've got to have a 'What the hell?' attitude." Julia Child