Living High off the Hog

The other day, I had a hankering for Brunswick stew. And I still (gloating) had the ingredients for cornbread. Believe it or not, I had found a packet of "barbecue" spice in Verona which I had been hoarding. Obviously, it was all coming together.

The only trouble was the meat.

In the US, I generally used Boston butt for that sort of dish. But how does one translate that? Culo (ass) di Boston? Probably NOT.

Woefully unprepared, therefore, I went to visit Paola and Andrea (the butchers). I explained that I was trying to make a sort of soup/stew that required a fairly fatty pork that could be roasted and then stewed and not get dry.  I explained the name, and said I had a hunch that it might be the ham, based on the name, but of course not cured?

After a bit of consultation, Paola confidently showed me a large hunk o' meat that had bones in it. "Nope, no bones."

"No problem; we'll take them out." Turns out that this piece was from the neck! Go figure. Since she thought it was my best bet, and I have absolute faith in her, I blithely walked out of there with a large chunk of boneless pork neck.

Curiosity got the better of me, though, so I did further investigation. The rest of you probably already know this, so I am therefore exposing my complete ignorance: Boston butt refers to a cut of meat commonly stored in barrels (butts, as in a water butt) and eaten in or coming from Boston. And guess what? Said Boston butt is the meat cut from ... the neck! Paola and Andrea come up spades again!

Love,

Alexandra

p.s. Guess what the word for "butt" is in Italian? In the context of barrel, it's "botte"

p.p.s. The Brunswick stew was delish