In this post, learn where true tallow comes from on an animal, its unique qualities, and historical uses that can still be utilized today!
When you dive into traditional cooking and make your own household essentials, you will find animal fats are a big part of it. Part of nose to tail eating means eating or using the overlooked (in recent times) fat of the animal. Since beef tallow is one of the more common fats to work with and more readily available, that’s what I usually focus on in my kitchen.
Tallow has many traditional uses that are not just for eatin’.
True tallow is not only great for sautéing and can make wonderfully flakey pastries but can also make hard soaps, creamy balms, and long lasting candles.
Should you make the switch? Some of the health and household product benefits will be discussed below.
What is tallow?
To know what tallow is you must know what suet is. Suet is the hard fat around the kidneys of ruminants including beef and sheep. When suet is rendered down it becomes tallow. Rendering removes the thin collagen holding everything together and congealed blood. You are left with a mostly white to off white solid block when cooled.
There is usually around 10-20lbs of useful beef suet on the animal. This can be rendered down to 1 1/2 to 1 3/4 cups of tallow for every pound of suet.
When properly rendered, completed tallow will have very little, if any beefy smell. When cooled, you can use this immediately or store in the refrigerator or freezer for later use.
Historically, tallow was one of the main fats/oils used for everything from cooking to creating soap. For homesteaders this is especially important for a self sufficient farm.
What isn’t tallow?
All beef fat is not created equal. Just like there are different cuts of meat, there are different cuts of fats.
Tallow is not the soft fat, or the subcutaneous fat within and throughout the muscles of the animal. Muscle fat can be left on cuts of meat or it can be cut off and rendered down in the same way suet is processed into tallow. This is similar to the difference between leaf lard vs. backfat lard.
When sourcing suet locally it is important to specify kidney fat suet. The first time I sourced my own suet for rendering, they brought out a bag of trimmed muscle fat. I have heard this has happened with others as well so be specific!
Why does it matter?
Rendered muscle fat and rendered suet are really a completely different product and have contrasting textures. True tallow is hard at room temperature and muscle fat will stay soft, almost like a butter. Depending on what you are using the fat for, it can make a big difference in the result.
If you are simply using the fat for frying something up or sautéing veggies you will likely not notice a difference. In fact, this is delicious and great use for rendered beef muscle fat!
If you would like to replace shortening for a pastry recipe you will want true tallow to get the most comparable results.
if you are making soap, candles, or a lip balm, the hard fat quality of true tallow will keep your creations nice and firm.
Health benefits And Public Opinion
I do not claim to know all the healthful benefits of tallow, but I do feel good about adding it to my varied diet. I also know pasture raised is always better.
There has been much more approval and less condemnation from the scientific community on consuming animal fat in recent years and the publics paradigm of animal fats has also been changing. For one, I know I was shocked to learn tallow is not a completely saturated fat – something I always assumed or heard. In fact, tallow has a decent amount of of monounsaturated fat, the so called ‘healthier’ fat.
- Tallow is 45-50% Saturated fat 42-50% Monounsaturated fat and 4% Polyunsaturated fat.
Grass fed and finished tallow is:
- High in heart healthy Omega 3’s
- Contains higher amounts of vitamin E, beta carotene, and vitamin C
I have even been to fancy restaurants that proudly state on their menus that they fry potatoes in duck fat or use lard in many of their dishes. Tallow and other fats high smoke point make it a great alternative to frying in vegetable oils.
Qualities And Alternative to Mass Produced Oils
True tallow is hard and has an almost brittle quality, even at room temperature. Due to these qualities, it is a very versatile fat for many personal and household products that currently use industrially grown hard fats like palm oil, which has been extremely devastating to forests world wide.
Reducing consumer demand on many mass produced fats, like palm oil, when something like home rendered tallow can replace it is great news for the eco-conscious DIY’er!
Tallow is very similar to our natural sebum, containing similar fatty acids in similar proportions to human skin, which makes it absorb very easily. Also, when you properly render tallow you will discover there is very little, it any beefy smell. When I make soap, the saponification process seems to completely eliminate any beefy-ness.
Summary
As a quick recap, you can render suet or kidney beef fat at home. This is a versatile fat that you can use for almost anything you use fat or oil for at home:
- Frying
- Baking pastries
- Soap
- Body Butter
- Lip balm
Stay tuned on a guide to rendering tallow at home!
[…] Tallow is 100% fat just like vegetable shortening and leaf lard. This is especially helpful in pastries where you want to prevent gluten formation and create fat pockets that result in a deliciously tender crust. This is also why you could use this same recipe and substitute leaf lard for the tallow. […]