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To Make Souse Cheese

Souse cheese is a pickled meat product made by boiling meat, mashing it, seasoning, and setting it in a brine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,814 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

To Make Souse Cheese

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the meat

  1. Clean the feet and head thoroughly.

  2. Soak in a weak brine for 24 hours.

  3. Drain.

  4. Place in cold water, adding a little salt.

  5. Boil gently until the meat separates from the bone.

  6. Once cool enough to handle, pick apart the meat.

  7. Mash it, discarding any bones.

  8. Add a small amount of the boiling liquid.

Set and store

  1. Season with pepper, salt, and a little vinegar.

  2. Pack the mixture into molds.

  3. Place a plate on top with a weight.

  4. Let it set for 24 hours.

  5. Prepare a weak brine.

  6. Cool it completely.

  7. Add vinegar until it is noticeable in taste.

  8. Strain the brine.

  9. Store it in a tub or keg to keep the souse immersed.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Pepper + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Meat + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,777 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Meat + vinegartop 31% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,428 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-methylbutanol (malty, whiskey).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Meat from the head and feet
Provides the gelatin and body that let the chopped meat hold together when it sets.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the flavor and helps preserve the souse.
Coarse sea salt
Seasons the meat and, in the brine, firms its texture during soaking.

The step that matters

Boil gently until the meat separates from the bone. Boiling too hard can toughen the meat and cloud the broth, while gentle heat slowly breaks down collagen into gelatin, which is what makes the souse set firm when cooled.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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