A tale of lost crackling - Welder's Dog leaves for Moscow

Since soon after covid-19 struck, we began getting fortnightly bunker boxes from the Welder's Dog. Welder's Dog is a local brewery and bar. When forced to close venues because of covid-19, they set up a cooperative on-line food delivery service using local suppliers.  

Even though it is yonks since covid-19 was anywhere near us, the practice has continued. We never know quite what we are going to get and that's fun. 

A week or so back we were promised a pork rack as part of our package along with a recipe for getting the best pork crackling. Now I love pork crackling and have mourned the increasing habit of trimming skin and fat from meat. 

Crumbed cutlets are delish but they need some fat. Pork chops are delish but you need the skin so that you can eat the chops with crackling.    

I first noticed this pernicious trimming practice down in Sydney when the health conscious super markets began trimming fat and skin, I am sure that this approach is very PC (politically correct) but it sent me in search of butcher shops that still provided the real thing. I found success at the local Chinese owned butcher's shop where pork chops were always on special and untrimmed! With baked vegetables they provided a luscious meal.

Sadly, this pernicious trimming habit has spread to Armidale. I guess that it's part of centralised service.delivery. The same problem problem afflicts some of our liquor outlets. I went into a local Liquorland to buy a bottle of wine. Struck by a sign saying "local wines"  I rushed across to find not a bottle of New England wine. To the marketers in head office, local means NSW. Now if I want to buy a bottle of Mudgee or Riverina wine I can do so, but its not local wine.

I digress! 

Imagine our distress when our bunker box came with a pork rack with all it's skin trimmed! We were not alone.

The Welder's Dog in Disgrace    

The following statement appeared on one of the Welder's Dog Facebook pages.

'Crackling Bungle Forces Bunker Box Boys Into Hiding'

After sending out skinless pork roasts for a crackling competition, it has been reported the shame was too much for the owners of Bunker Boxes and that they have gone to ground. A spokesperson for the company earlier today released this statement:

'We are sorry to everyone from the bottom of our heart. The competition will still run, just send in a picture of your roast, or even better just roast us in a message, we deserve it. We have gone on a soul searching journey to get to the bottom of what has happened and take out anyone we find removing skin from pork, which is a capital sin. This goes all the way to the top. We're thinking probably Trump or Putin has their grubby mits all over this. Please buy a Bunker Box this week to fund our return tickets as we left in a hurry with no forethought whatsoever.

A little later came this email. Headed "TOPSECRET COMMUNIQUE: the crackling investigation continues", it read:

Our beloved email subscribers who we forced to subscribe, we write to you this week deep behind enemy lines. 

As you may have seen on facebook, we have set off on a mission to discover who skinned this week's pork roast, an obvious and deliberate act of sabotage against our crackling competition. We take full responsibility however it was definitely not our fault and we take no responsibility. So far we have followed the money through the hands of many crooked butchers millions of kilometers into Russia after a reliable tip-off from Dales' greek uncle.

We hope this message finds you well, the cold winters in Petrograd are hard on the postal service, however they have absolutely no effect on the internet at all so there's really no reason you shouldn't get this. 

We hope the fact that your pork is some of the most succulent we have ever tasted is some recompense for the lack of skin, although even saying the words 'lack of skin' reminds us that it is not. We will bring back the skin of the culprit as punishment and send you all a small square. Except the vegetarians. Actually, bad idea, except everyone. 

As our mission here continues and we seek justice, please order next week's Bunker Box, we will email again tomorrow with the delicious ingredients however we thought you deserved an update on the crackling competition. Please still email in your roasts and we will choose the best one and award the Bunker Box. 

spokoynoy nochi

goodnight

We do forgive you, but please get your act into gear. We need you. All is forgiven.