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How to choose Pork, Brawn and Venison
smell; ami for newness, ami staleness, this tiesh bought
fresh has but few signs, the more material is its clammi-
ness, and the rest your smell will inform you. If it be
bruised these places will look more dusky or blacker than
the rest.
Pork. If young, the lean will break in pinching be-
tween the fingers ; and if you nip the skin with your
nails, it will make a dent; also if the fat be soft and pulpy,
like lard: if the lean be tough, and the fat flabby and
spungy, feeling rough, it is old, especially if the rind be
stubborn, and you cannot nip it with your nails.
If a boar, though young, or a hog gelded at full growth,
the flesh will be hard, tough, red, and rammish of smell;
the fat skinny and hard ; the skin thick and rough, and
pinched up, will immediately fall again.
As for old or new killed, try the legs, hands, and springs,
by putting the linger under the bone that comes out;
if it be tainted, you will there find it by smelling the
finger ; besides the skin will be sweaty and clammy when
stale, but cool and smooth when new.
If you find little kernels in the fat of the pork, like
nail-shot it is measly, and dangerous to be eaten. Pork
comes in in the middle of August, and holds good till
Lady-day.
How to chuse Brawn, Venison, Westphalia, Hams, Sfc.
Brawn is known to be hold or young by the extraordi-
nary or moderate thickness of the rind ; the thick is
old, the moderate young. If the rind and fat be tender,
it is not boar brawn, but barrow or sow.
Venison. Try the haunches or shoulders under the
bones that come out with your finger or knife, and as the
scent is sweet or rank, it is new or stale ; and the like of
the sides in the fleshy parts ; if tainted, they will look
green in some places, or more than ordinary black.
Look on the hoofs, and if the clefts are very wide
and rough, it is old ; if close and smooth it is young.
The buck venison begins in May, and is in high season
till AllhallowVday: the doe from Michaelmas to the end
of December, or sometimes to the end of January
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