Hey Gang,
  I was recently given some bear fat which I rendered into lard.  For some reason the lard is not solidifying at room temperature, but does when refrigerated.  Did I do something wrong or is there a way to get it to "gel"?  
 To render I cut up the fat and cooked it slowly for several hours, removed the cracklings, and poured the liquid into mason jars to cool.  Thanks for the help fellas, MG

bear fat is not hard at normal room temp... turn your thermostat down     :D

just what do you do with it anyway ???

When we lived in Alaska, my mother would cook with it.  Bill

I've never tasted bear, but i'm kinda drooling thinking about roast potatoes cooked in this stuff!

:-D

bear lard makes killer pie crusts, and biscuits.Both require deep chilling the lard.

really!! never knew that . I guess I just wasted mine. I shot a nice bear and the meat is great but no lard/fat. all cleaned away.

I may give that a try next fall.

I used to hunt out of an old cabin that a fellow owned. It had been there and the primary residence of his family since the early 1900s. The old wooden floor of the cabin looked like new back in the 1980s when I used to hunt out of it. Other than the floor, the cabin was in pretty rough shape. I asked him once why they had put a new floor in it and had not done anything else to the cabin. He told me that one winter day, when his mother was rendering bear grease the dogs came through the cabin and knocked the pots onto the floor. Hence the like new condition of the floor.

I'll tell ya what. Taters fried in bear grease is THE ONLY way to go. We've rendered fat from lots of bears and used lots of the rendered fat for cooking with,plain and simple it just can't be beat.

bear fat is also great first aid salve for cuts !!!! ........... they will heal really fast !!!!

Matt I do it just like you do and put it in mason jars in the refrigerator, in fact there's some in there now.

We used it for cooking years back. My wife made cookies and pie crust with it and we used it for frying grease. One time back in the late 80's my friend Jay Massey from Alaska was staying with us for a few days while we were doing a trade show together here in Michigan. One evening while we were watching TV I popped a batch of pop corn. Jay said, "Ron, this is really good pop corn" I told him I had popped it in bear fat and he said, "Really, I'll have to tell Martha about that"..(Martha was Jays wife)

Melt a little bees wax in with it and it makes a good patch lube for the old flintlock. You can also put it on your boots for water proofing and a little dab on your hair will knock down the frizzes..that's without the bees wax of coarse..    

I have some that I rendered YEARS ago(95) and it is still solid. I used to pop corn with it, now I just grease some boots or such. If yours is not setting up I might think you need to cook it longer and get the water out. just thinking maybe.

When you render it, how hot do you get it in the pot? also for how long?
What are you looking for it to do so you know it is done?

I shot my first bear and saved the fat. Put it in plastic bags in the freezer till I could find out how to render it. Heard it is good for ML patch but, the cooking sounds great.

i overheated the last batch i did, gave it a bit too much flavor for cooking   :rolleyes:
next fall bear i get i am going to try putting a big dutch oven in the
oven and bring it up to the proper temp, but not above, and put bits of fat in it a few at a time.
only problem is that since i read about this method i forgot what the right temp was...  
anybody know?

ttt