The texturous wonder of stewed pig feet
Today has been good to me, and despite the common attitude of Americans toward anything but “common meats,” I think it’s time to talk about one of the most tasteworthy albeit shunned part of a pig. They package and sell it at the Super Walmart in Humble, they’ve been eating it with banh canh (a Southwestern Vietnamese udon-like rice noodle soup) probably since the Southwestern delta became part of Vietnam. (And no, it is not because meat was rare that they had to eat everything, the Southwestern delta region is the most prosperous piece of land of the country.) It takes some work to cook, a strong hand to rub salt and wash, many hours of stewing on a stove, but the result never fails your satisfaction. Yes, it’s the foot of a pig.
It looks chubby, but if it’s cooked well, it takes almost no effort to rip the edible part off the bone, and even less to chew. It is a layer of thick skin with tendon and very little fat, extremely tender, but not too tender to lose the firm texture. It’s good because it’s firm and tender. It’s not dry and fibrous like a piece of pale chicken breast. It doesn’t need a knife to cut like a chunk of steak, it just comes off the bone. It is washable with salt water before cooking, unlike a snail. It doesn’t need a handful of spice or a skillet of oil and batter to buff up the taste like a fish fillet. You can keep it as simple as boiling in a pot of water, and the natural sweetness from its bone marrow will make it good on its own. My mom doesn’t cook it with banh canh either (for those who are interested in banh canh gio heo, here’s the recipe). She lets it sit on the stove for a while, then throws in vegetable of choice, usually potato, carrot, and broccoli, and a couple of eggs, to make a soup. Her most recent creation is pig’s feet stewed with artichoke, or “gio heo ham atiso“.
A recollection here. During lunch break in high school, some kids usually go out to a noodle shack outside the school gate to get a bowl of banh canh gio heo. They have lots of those in Saigon, where it can be anything from a house transformed into a small eatery indoor, or a few plastic chairs, a small folding table, and a noodle cart on the sidewalk. In those bowls you can see at most a slice or two of pig’s trotter, but never the whole thing. It’s expensive for the work put into cooking it, for its texture, and for its scarcity. One pig has only 4 of those but a ton of meat, and no dummy would raise a pig for its feet, so only when there are tons of pork sold that pigs would be killed, and pig’s feet would be available. Keep buying pork, guys!
PS: Good to see the foggy side of the world enjoy this as well.
Hhahahaa “keep buying pork, guys” =)) =))
Thiec lan dau tien tui moi nghe co chien rang mua thit heo de co gio heo =)) =)). Sau Nhi thiec la thong minh. Hảo hảo 😀
1Keep up the superb piece of work, I read few blog posts on this site and I conceive that your weblog is rattling interesting and has got bands of fantastic information.
2Utterly composed subject matter, regards for information .
3excellent issues altogether, you simply received a logo new reader. What might you recommend in regards to your put up that you just made a few days in the past? Any positive?
4It¦s actually a cool and helpful piece of information. I¦m glad that you shared this helpful info with us. Please stay us informed like this. Thank you for sharing.
5Hello. impressive job. I did not anticipate this. This is a excellent story. Thanks!
6Thank you for helping out, superb info. “The four stages of man are infancy, childhood, adolescence, and obsolescence.” by Bruce Barton.
7My coder is trying to convince me to move to .net from PHP. I have always disliked the idea because of the costs. But he’s tryiong none the less. I’ve been using Movable-type on numerous websites for about a year and am worried about switching to another platform. I have heard very good things about blogengine.net. Is there a way I can import all my wordpress content into it? Any kind of help would be greatly appreciated!
8I’m also commenting to make you know of the fabulous discovery our girl had browsing your site. She picked up a good number of issues, which include what it’s like to possess an ideal giving mood to get others really easily completely grasp selected complicated subject matter. You actually surpassed readers’ expected results. Thank you for presenting those informative, dependable, edifying and in addition easy tips on your topic to Lizeth.
9I wish to express my appreciation for your kindness supporting men who have the need for assistance with the area. Your special commitment to passing the message all through has been definitely helpful and has always allowed guys just like me to get to their pursuits. This important tips and hints denotes this much a person like me and even more to my peers. Thanks a lot; from everyone of us.
10excellent points altogether, you just gained a emblem new reader. What may you suggest about your publish that you simply made some days ago? Any sure?
11Hi, just required you to know I he added your site to my Google bookmarks due to your layout. But seriously, I believe your internet site has 1 in the freshest theme I??ve came across. It extremely helps make reading your blog significantly easier.
12Hi my friend! I wish to say that this post is amazing, nice written and include approximately all significant infos. I’d like to look extra posts like this .
13I really like your writing style, superb information, thanks for posting :D.
14Perfect piece of work you have done, this internet site is really cool with good information.
15My brother suggested I may like this blog. He was totally right. This put up truly made my day. You cann’t imagine just how a lot time I had spent for this information! Thank you!
16I truly appreciate this post. I’ve been looking all over for this! Thank goodness I found it on Bing. You’ve made my day! Thanks again
17I was just looking for this information for some time. After 6 hours of continuous Googleing, at last I got it in your website. I wonder what is the lack of Google strategy that do not rank this kind of informative web sites in top of the list. Normally the top websites are full of garbage.
18Perfectly pent subject matter, thanks for information .
19Write more, thats all I have to say. Literally, it seems as though you relied on the video to make your point. You obviously know what youre talking about, why throw away your intelligence on just posting videos to your blog when you could be giving us something enlightening to read?
20Have you ever considered about adding a little bit more than just your articles? I mean, what you say is important and all. But just imagine if you added some great images or videos to give your posts more, “pop”! Your content is excellent but with pics and video clips, this site could undeniably be one of the most beneficial in its field. Good blog!
21I am really enjoying the theme/design of your weblog. Do you ever run into any internet browser compatibility problems? A handful of my blog audience have complained about my site not operating correctly in Explorer but looks great in Chrome. Do you have any advice to help fix this issue?
22You really make it seem so easy with your presentation but I find this matter to be really something which I think I would never understand. It seems too complicated and extremely broad for me. I’m looking forward for your next post, I will try to get the hang of it!
23I do not even understand how I ended up right here, however I assumed this post was once good. I do not know who you’re however definitely you’re going to a well-known blogger for those who aren’t already 😉 Cheers!
24It’s hard to find knowledgeable people on this topic, but you sound like you know what you’re talking about! Thanks
25I used to be recommended this web site by way of my cousin. I’m now not certain whether or not this publish is written through him as no one else recognise such detailed approximately my trouble. You’re incredible! Thanks!
26I visited a lot of website but I conceive this one has got something special in it in it
27Thanks for your marvelous posting! I genuinely enjoyed reading it, you are a great author.I will always bookmark your blog and will come back sometime soon. I want to encourage yourself to continue your great posts, have a nice day!
28I like this site very much, Its a rattling nice situation to read and find information.
29This is a topic close to my heart cheers, where are your contact details though?
30You made some first rate factors there. I regarded on the internet for the difficulty and located most individuals will go along with along with your website.
31There is obviously a bundle to realize about this. I feel you made some good points in features also.
32Hello, Neat post. There’s an issue together with your web site in internet explorer, would check this… IE nonetheless is the market chief and a good part of other people will miss your fantastic writing because of this problem.
33Some truly interesting information, well written and loosely user genial.
34I’ll immediately grab your rss feed as I can’t find your email subscription link or newsletter service. Do you have any? Kindly let me know in order that I could subscribe. Thanks.
35There are actually a lot of particulars like that to take into consideration. That is a great point to convey up. I supply the ideas above as common inspiration however clearly there are questions like the one you bring up the place crucial factor can be working in sincere good faith. I don?t know if greatest practices have emerged round things like that, but I’m sure that your job is clearly recognized as a fair game. Both boys and girls feel the influence of only a second’s pleasure, for the rest of their lives.
36Thank you for any other informative web site. Where else may just I am getting that kind of info written in such a perfect means? I have a project that I’m just now running on, and I’ve been on the glance out for such info.
37You have brought up a very excellent details , appreciate it for the post.
38Those are yours alright! . We at least need to get these people stealing images to start blogging! They probably just did a image search and grabbed them. They look good though!
39I am continually searching online for articles that can help me. Thank you!
40Loving the information on this website , you have done great job on the posts.
41I like what you guys are up too. Such intelligent work and reporting! Carry on the excellent works guys I have incorporated you guys to my blogroll. I think it’ll improve the value of my website :).
42Exactly what I was searching for, thanks for putting up.
43I am glad to be one of several visitants on this outstanding website (:, thankyou for posting.
44I’ve been browsing on-line greater than three hours nowadays, but I by no means discovered any interesting article like yours. It is lovely price enough for me. In my opinion, if all web owners and bloggers made good content as you did, the web might be much more useful than ever before.
45Hi there very cool website!! Man .. Excellent .. Amazing .. I’ll bookmark your site and take the feeds alsoKI’m satisfied to seek out numerous helpful info here in the submit, we want develop extra techniques on this regard, thank you for sharing. . . . . .
46I’ll right away grab your rss feed as I can’t find your e-mail subscription hyperlink or newsletter service. Do you’ve any? Please permit me recognise so that I could subscribe. Thanks.
47The root of your writing while sounding reasonable originally, did not settle well with me after some time. Someplace within the sentences you managed to make me a believer unfortunately just for a very short while. I still have got a problem with your jumps in assumptions and one would do well to help fill in all those breaks. In the event that you actually can accomplish that, I could surely be impressed.
48I think other website proprietors should take this site as an model, very clean and great user friendly style and design, as well as the content. You’re an expert in this topic!
49