Dear Food Goddess:

‘In the late 1940s and early 1950s, my dad used to fix porchetta. My brother and I have always tried to duplicate the crackling skin that made my dad’s porchetta so good. When I saw the skin described that way in the recently published Anne Quatrano recipe, I also noticed the pork was brined. It made me wonder. I didn’t remember my dad soaking it in brine, but I am curious: Exactly what does brine do? Is it really necessary?’

CARMELA LYONS, Tallapoosa

Just reading this question made the goddess’s stomach growl with hunger. After that description, there’s nothing this astral adviser would like to do more right now than sink her teeth into a big juicy hunk of pork. But she digresses.

To address Ms. Lyons’ inquiry and return to the proper decorum, the culinary queen graciously answers. Brining involves soaking meat in a saline solution, sometimes with other spices and seasonings. This does a couple of things, most notably to rephrase the “Saturday Night Live” weightlifters, it “plumps it up.” Brining is most often used in lean cuts that tend to dry out from overcooking, such as pork tenderloin and turkey breasts. Think of the finished product as meat with moisture overload.

To sound like a professional, the goddess advises throwing around the word denature. This is a fancy way of describing how the salt from the brine dissolves some of the proteins in the muscle fibers, making the meat more tender.

Brining can also permeate the meat with flavor. As the meat absorbs the brine it will also absorb the other seasonings.

Now back to that porchetta. The goddess conferred with her esteemed colleague, John Kessler, who tested that recipe. He advised that the scored thick skin of that cut of meat, coupled with its underlying layer of fat and the slow cooking method used, probably contributed more to the crackling skin than the brine in this recipe.

Check it out for yourself at projects.eveningedge.com/recipes/anne-quatranos-porchetta/

Recipe swap

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> Regina Clark of Decatur is looking for, not just any, but the best banana pudding recipe from Southern Living from around 2002. The custard was homemade and used vanilla wafers. She says, “It was not difficult and the results were divine!!”

The Food Goddess wishes to answer all your food questions and share your kitchen tips and recipe requests. Write to foodgoddess@ajc.com or to Food Goddess, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Sixth Floor, 72 Marietta St. N.W., Atlanta, GA 30303.

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