Over the years, I have had SO MANY requests for our plain rendered tallow, and I am happy to say that we're finally in a place to be able to make that happen! Our tallow comes from local (to us), organic grass-fed/finished beef cattle farms in raw suet form which I gently dry-render in-house. What is "dry rendering" you might ask? So happy you did. There are two basic rendering methods - dry rendering and wet rendering. With dry rendering, the suet is gently heated, constantly watched and stirred while the temperature is closely monitored to make sure that it never gets hot enough to damage tallow's delicate nutrients. The wet rendering method involves adding water (most often a saltwater brine) to the tallow and walking away; letting the tallow simmer in the saltwater bath for hours. The tallow is then ladled off, and the process is repeated (often several times). Practitioners of wet rendering call this "purifying" the tallow, and while it certainly does produce a whiter, firmer tallow with less scent, it also damages some of its vitamins and nutrients; most notably the Omega 3s (and with them, tallow's natural omega 3-to-6 balance). Amusingly enough, this "purification" process can also introduce pathogens to the tallow since water is the enemy of fat and can easily cause it to go rancid; compromising its safety and efficacy. Commercial tallow is almost exclusively wet-rendered and frequently even bleached (all this obsessive need for pure whiteness is sounding kinda aryan, if you ask me). I liken it to commercial honey. Sure, it's still honey, but it's been processed to high hell and stripped of many of its nutrients just so it doesn't crystalize on the supermarket shelf. Dry rendered tallow, however, is much closer to raw honey as its nutritional integrity is still in-tact. Sure, it may be a bit softer, it'll have a bit more natural scent, it may even crystalize (yep, tallow can crystalize), but it'll still be the nutrient-dense superfat you want and your skin deserves.
Straight-up rendered tallow isn't so much intended as a skincare product itself, but as an ingredient for all you clever, crafty DIYers out there to make your own tallow-based skincare products with. Can you eat it? No, Marcy. This is skincare. I guess that puts it in the "cosmetic grade" category, but this isn't the cosmetic grade of the commercial world - a category meaning that it can be up to, get this, 30% something else. THIRTY PERCENT!!! WTF!?!? In order for me to call this "food grade" I'd need to go through the pricey rigmarole of licensing for production, storage, and sales (both in and out of state). It would cost me more. It would cost you more. And I'm not tryina sell food. I was a chef for 20+ years before doing this. Food and I have moved on. We're seeing other people. Don't eat the skincare.
