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Hog Heads and Liver Sausage

A sausage made from pickled hog heads, hog cheek meat, beef liver, ham skins, onions, salt, white pepper, marjoram, and beef rounds.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,092 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Hog Heads and Liver Sausage

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Combine pickled hog heads, hog cheek meat, beef liver, ham skins, onions, salt, white pepper, marjoram, and beef rounds in a large mixing bowl. Mix thoroughly until all ingredients are well combined.

Form and cook

  1. Stuff the mixture into sausage casings or form into patties as desired.

  2. Cook the sausage in boiling water until fully cooked, then allow to cool before serving.

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. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Onion + marjoramtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,056 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Meat + beeftop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,533 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  4. Meat + hamtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,095 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  5. Liver + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,420 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

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

What each ingredient does

Pickled hog heads
Provides the main meat and gelatinous body that helps the sausage hold together.
Hog cheek meat
Adds rich, fatty meat that keeps the sausage moist and tender.
Beef liver
Contributes savory depth and a smooth, finely textured binding to the mixture.
Ham skins
Adds gelatin and fat that help bind the mixture and give a moist texture.

The step that matters

Cooking in boiling water until fully cooked. Sausage made from meat and offal must reach a safe internal temperature throughout. Simmering gently rather than boiling hard helps prevent casings from bursting and keeps the texture tender.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, beef, liver, ham, onion, marjoram):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Garlicfits better
  3. Parsleyfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, beef, liver, ham, onion, marjoram. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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