Pancetta

Crinkles hold rendered fat where a flat leaf would let it run straight off.

Bitterness needs fat to stop being punishment. This is the cheapest source.

Rendered fat plus starch water emulsifies into a sauce with no cream in it.

Sweet green and cured salt; the pea is the seasoning, not the vegetable.

Cured fat sticks to roasted sugar and stops it cloying.

Soffritto starts here. The fat is the cooking medium and the flavour base.

Camphor cuts the fat and survives the long, low render.

Earth needs salt, and the pulse drinks fat like it was designed to.

Deglaze while the fat is still hot; acid stops the pan tasting only of pork.

Cured pork gives salt; the lentil gives it somewhere to go.

Cured fat renders into the pot and the bean absorbs every gram of it.

Rendered first so the fat is the cooking medium, not a garnish.

Bitter stalks wilted in the fat; the mineral note is what you came for.

Both starchy-sweet and nutty; an autumn soup that needs almost nothing else.

Cure salt on sweet shellfish, without smoke muddying the sea note.

Pork fat carries the brine further than olive oil manages on its own.

Roasted bitterness against clean cured fat; no smoke to fight the beans.