Sweetbreads: Sweetbread Recipes: Sweetbreads With Bacon Mushroom Shallot And Garlic

Sweetbreads: Sweetbread Recipes

 



 

 

 

 

This week guys I am making sweetbreads! What are sweetbreads you ask? Well to quote my favorite chef Jacques Pepin  sweetbreads are part of a cooking set known as "essential offal." I was just a young boy the first time I had sweetbreads. I must have been 16yrs old if that and my mom was dating a real Arizona cowboy at the time and he was the one who introduced me to sweetbreads! This man whose name was Howard is also the man responsible for my initial interest in knives of all kinds and it's because of this introduction to knives that is responsible for my current skill set with knives and not just kitchen knives. The sweetbreads that Howard made were soaked in salt water overnight and then poached in water for a few minutes and then cooked in butter until they were caramelized and nut brown a bit crispy and delicious indeed! it's hard to describe how sweetbreads taste but suffice to say besides the bit of crunch from the caramelizing they were so tender you just can't believe it! They were meaty indeed with a slight sweetness flavor that I had never experienced before. I have been eating sweetbreads since then in many different ways.

So for those of you that have never had the pleasure of eating sweetbreads you may ask what are sweetbreads? Sweetbreads are the pancreas and thymus glands and calf, veal, lamb and pork! Some chefs and people call the thymus the throat sweetbread or in French cooking the thymus is referred to as a "gorge." Also in French the pancreas is referred to as the "noix." The "noix" sweetbread is from the stomach or heart and the "gorge" sweetbread comes from the animals throat.

There are of course with all things different levels of quality in sweetbreads just as there is different levels of quality in just about anything you buy. The absolute best quality sweetbreads are considered to come from veal or calves that are milk fed and the sweetbreads from lamb are highly prized as well. The best part is that sweetbreads are delicious and they are very affordable whether they come from the pig, calf, veal or lamb. In my humble opinion I think you my readers should try them all ASAP! Personally I like to consider sweetbreads as what I refer to as quite posh! Sweetbreads are made all over the world and in many different ways and I doubt that I will every get to try them all but, I will try to!

Personally, I don't find sweetbreads to be very popular where I live or anyplace that I have ever lived. A lot of people I know don't know what a sweetbread is or they have never tried them before. Sweetbreads are not the easiest dish to prepare because you have to dicker around with them a bit before you get to the point of cooking them but the dickering is well worth it. The issue with preparing sweetbreads is that they have a rather thick membrane surrounding them and the cook needs to get the membranes off the sweetbread before cooking them. The trick is to keep just enough of the membrane on the sweetbreads to keep them in one piece and discard the rest. It's a bit tricky but even if you take off all the the membrane and the sweetbreads to not remain intact you can still cook them and totally enjoy them.

Now as I have stated the sweetbreads themselves can be cooked in many different ways and are an extremely affordable and versatile food. No matter how you finally decide to cook your sweetbreads the fact of the matter is that no matter what kind of sweetbreads you are going to make either from veal, lamb, pork, beef they will all be prepared the same way initially! The first step in preparing sweetbreads is the soaking process. The sweetbreads must be soaked in cold water. It's best to have your cold water "acidulated" That sounds complicated but it's not. Acidulated water is just water that has an acid content in it from lemon juice, lime juice, vinegar or white wine. Basically this acidulated water step is no different than brining. When I brine or acidulate something I like to do it for at least 24hrs. In this case the acidulated water is designed to get impurities out of the sweetbreads. The term for this part of the sweetbreads preparation is called "degorging". Make sure that you change the acidulated water at least once every six to eight hours before moving on to the next step in the sweetbreads preparation.

The next step in the sweetbreads initial preparation is to poach or blanch the sweetbreads in cold water taht is brought up to a slow boil. There are a couple of ways to perform the poaching or blanching of the sweetbreads. The first is the cold water or you may opt to poach/blanch the sweetbreads in some kind of stock of which any will do or you can make something called a "court bouillon". A court bouillon is basically a stock of your own making using your chosen herbs and spices to poach/blanch your sweetbreads in. Basically a court bouillon is an aromatic soup of your making and in general terms a court bouillon is used in the poaching of fish and shellfish but it great for poaching your sweetbreads. After the sweetbreads have been blanched your take them from the hot liquid of your choice and put them in ice cold water to shock them. This blanching and shocking step helps to get rid of more impurities that might still be in your sweetbreads. The blanching process can take anywhere from 2 to 15 minutes depending on your needs. I usually blanch for about 10 minutes.

The third step in the sweetbreads initial preparation is to remove that membrane I was talking about earlier in this post. Just use your hands and remove the membrane/veins and do it gently. The fourth and final step of your initial preparation is a judgement call on your part depending on how you want your sweetbreads to come out or how you are going to use them in any particular dish. The optional last step is pressing your sweetbreads before cooking them. This is done by taking a plate or baking dish and lining it with a clean towel and then laying your sweetbreads on top of the towel then put another towel on top of the sweetbreads and put another plate or baking dish on top and then find some canned food and put a couple of pounds of weight on top of the sweetbreads to press them. It is best to get 5 to 10 lbs of weight on the sweetbreads to press them. Put the sweetbreads in your refrigerator for between 4 to 24 hours to get the excess water out of the sweetbreads. You want the sweetbreads to be pressed to about 3/4 of an inch. This makes the sweetbreads a bit denser and meatier. I love to press my sweetbreads because of the consistency that I get out of them this way. Remember! This is an optional step. You don't have to press your sweetbreads and they will still be delicious!

Now all the initial preparation has paid off and it's time to cook up some sweetbreads! There are tons of ways to cook sweetbreads. You can saute sweetbreads in a red or white wine or you can deep fry your sweetbreads by either battering them or dredging them the southern fried way. You can put sweet bread on the grill or cedar plank cook them. Here's one for you....Put your sweetbreads in the wood smoker for awhile and they will be yummy! You can braise them, roast them, poach sweetbreads! The ways to cook sweetbreads is endless if you really want to think about it. I would have to say that sweetbreads are my favorite form of essential offal as Jacques Pepin would say. I will be serving these sweetbreads with a side of pan seared pearl onions and artichoke hearts! Watch the video and enjoy!


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