Pork Rinds - Page 254

I was absolutely convinced I was going to f**k these up.  I've played around with the skin of a pig before and it has never turned out well.  Looking at the recipe, I knew it wasn't going to be easy.  There was a lot of pressure to get all the fat off.  Then you have to scrape the skin until it's translucent.  Then you have to cook it in 83 Degree Celsius water for 24 hours.  Now I don't have a sous vide machine, nor do I have an immersion circulator.  What I do have is a pot, ziploc bags, a fry thermometer and a probe thermometer with an alarm.

So here's what I did (after working on the skin with a knife and a bench scraper for an hour): I put the skin in a ziploc freezer bag and immersed it in water to force every bit of air out.  I put it in a pot of water with both thermometers.  I set the probe thermometer for 85 Celsius using the alarm.  I adjusted the stove element, the lid and the pot position to get the temperature stable (I had to move it from big to small burner to keep the temperature low enough.)  Once stable, I checked on it every couple hours for just under 12 hours, then called it good.

24 hours in the dehydrator and they looked sad.  Very sad.  I did not have high hopes.  I waited a couple days because Ox was going to be frying turkey leftover egg rolls, so I figured we could fry them then.  While rolling egg rolls the oil hit 350F and we dropped the dehydrated skins in.  MAGIC!  They puffed up beautifully and tasted awesome!  I could not believe how well they came out.

Sean Brock is a miracle worker!

Advice: Get an immersion circulator.  My method was just stupid, and I wouldn't have done it if we hadn't promised to do every recipe in the book.  Ox says he has no problem with me investing in one for us - fat chance.