I don't know if this is what you mean, i took the lard from the butcher, put it thru the food processor, then melted it, it seemed like there were strings or something that i had to put out.....let it cool, then added my bird seed them put into shapes.........If after cooking if i let it harden, it was white hard, not like crisco............

Well kinda. You take the "fat" from the butcher...cook (render) it, stiring often, skim off the cracklins when they float to the top, then the liquid fat left is lard. At least that is how we made it. Usually in a 5 gallon pot over an open fire, being very careful to not burn it.
I know someone on here said they rendered it in the oven. That sounds much easier but I don't know how that works (temps, time, ect). HTH's.
Ruth

As someone said earlier, lard is the name given to the rendered fat. Suet or back fat is what you want to ask the butcher for.

There are a couple of ways to render the fat here: http://www.thenourishinggourmet.com...ender-lard.html

It looks like back fat in the photo. Nothing wrong with that (I often use it), but suet from around the kidneys is better, IMO, because it has a less "porky" flavour.

I do mine at a slightly lower temperature 140-145ºC. I don't really time it, but keep draining the rendered fat every now and then. I whack the heat up at the end to make crispy, fatty bits of goodness that don't seem to last very long at all!

I get mine at my local Hispanic Fresh Market-they have a butcher shop. It comes in long round deli type containers and is more liquidy and darker than the hyrdogenated white bricks.

my grandma in the US buys 5 pound buckets of it from a huge shop called BJs!