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Fried Porksteaks
Fry like beefsteaks, with pepper and salt; or sprinkle with dry powdered sage if the sausage flavor is liked. - Mrs. B. A. Fay.
A two-line recipe that assumes you already know how to fry a steak. What it leaves out is the cut, the heat and the doneness, all of which matter more for pork than for beef.
- What a pork steak wasThe recipe does not say which cut. In nineteenth-century use a "pork steak" was generally a slice from the shoulder or the loin end of a fresh-killed hog, cut thin by modern standards. The nearest modern equivalent is a blade or shoulder steak, well marbled and forgiving, rather than a lean centre-cut chop.
- "Fry like beefsteaks"That means a heavy skillet over fairly high heat, a light film of fat, and no crowding. Pork shoulder renders enough of its own fat that you need very little to start; get the pan hot before the meat goes in or it will steam and grey over.
- DonenessWell-done pork was the general advice of the period, trichinosis being a known and much-discussed risk by the later nineteenth century. Current guidance is 145F at the centre with a three-minute rest, which leaves the meat faintly pink and considerably juicier. A thicker shoulder steak benefits from going further, to about 160F, because the connective tissue needs the extra heat.
- TimingHalf-inch steaks want roughly three to four minutes a side. Thicker shoulder cuts are better seared, then finished covered over low heat for another eight to ten minutes.
- The sageDry powdered sage is what gives commercial breakfast sausage its signature flavour, which is exactly the point Mrs. Fay is making. Use about a quarter teaspoon per steak, rubbed on with the salt and pepper; ground sage turns bitter if it scorches, so add it to the second side rather than the first.
- Seasoning timeSalt the steaks at least fifteen minutes ahead if you can, or immediately before they hit the pan. Salting in the awkward middle window draws moisture to the surface and ruins the browning.
- YieldReckon one steak of six to eight ounces per person. The recipe says nothing about gravy, though pan drippings loosened with a splash of water or milk and thickened with a spoonful of flour are an obvious use for what is left in the skillet.
The Dixie Cook-Book belongs to a family of late nineteenth-century compilations built from contributed household recipes, and entries like this one show what such books were actually for: not teaching technique, but recording the small variations a particular cook was known for. Fresh pork was seasonal in the rural South, concentrated in the cold months around hog-killing, when the sides and hams went to salt and smoke while the shoulder and loin had to be eaten within days. Frying steaks from that fresh meat was the quickest way to use it. The sage suggestion is a shortcut to sausage flavour without the labour of grinding and stuffing, and sage has long been the defining seasoning of English and American fresh pork sausage. The attribution to Mrs. B. A. Fay is typical of the genre, where a name beside a recipe served as a form of credit.