Lardun

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A small strip of pork fat or bacon that is threaded into lean meat before cooking to add moisture and flavour
2. A thin piece of fatty bacon pushed into meat or poultry during preparation so that it bastes the flesh as it cooks
3. Strips of cured pork fat inserted into a cut of lean meat, used in traditional cookery to keep the flesh moist

Etymology: Medieval cooks used "lardun" for a thin strip of bacon or pork fat. Cooks threaded these strips into lean meat such as game or roasts, using a special needle called a larding needle, so the meat stayed moist as it cooked. The word came into Middle English from Old French "lardon", a diminutive of "lard", meaning fat or bacon. The "-on" ending makes a small piece of the larger thing, so a lardon is literally a little lard. Old French "lard" came from Latin "lardum", meaning bacon or animal fat. That Latin source is what links the English word to the same root as the modern "lard", the rendered pig fat used in baking. The word lost its everyday use as cooking methods changed, and today it survives mainly in older cookbooks and dictionaries. Its meaning stayed close to its origin: a strip of fat, pushed into meat by hand.