1001 Kitchen tips #47 - How do I reduce the fat content of a meat dish or gravy?

Everyone knows that along with red meat comes a certain amount of fat. Some fat is good for you - it contains fat soluble vitamins, but we also know the effects of too much saturated fat.

• You can use a fat seperator jug - as the fat settles to the top this enables you to pour the gravy from the bottom, thus leaving the fat in the jug.
  
• You can use a piece of kitchen paper - if you drop this on the surface on the sauce it will soak up the fat. You can keep doing this till the fat is removed. More ideal for small scale home use. You can also use a slice of stale bread for this.
  
• You can skim the sauce/ stock with a small ladle while it's boiling. Swirl the base of the ladle in the top of the sauce and the fat moves to the side of the pan where you can remove it more easily.
  
• You can remove the fat from your sauce by chilling it and - as shown below - the fat will rise to the top and solidify. This makes it easy to remove - either with a skimmer (a wonderful tool) or by pouring through a sieve.

Fat removed from lamb and apricot casserole

Don't throw the fat away though, you can use it to make fat balls - the birds in your garden will love you for ever.

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