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Pork Brawn

A preserved pork head and feet dish, cured with salt, sugar, spices, boiled, minced, and set in a tin.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Mace and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,557 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Pork Brawn

Ingredients

Directions

Cure

  1. Clean and wash the pig's head and feet.

  2. Sprinkle with 2 tablespoons of coarse sea salt and let drain overnight.

  3. Dry with a soft cloth.

  4. Rub in a mixture of 6 ounces common salt, 6 ounces moist sugar, ½ ounce saltpetre, and ¼ ounce black pepper.

  5. Rub the mixture into every part of the head, tongue, ears, and feet. Turn them over.

  6. Rub again daily for 10 days.

  7. Wash off the pickle.

Cook

  1. Cut off the ears.

  2. Boil the feet and ears for 1.5 hours.

  3. Add the head and tongue. Cover with cold water.

  4. Boil until the meat separates from the bones.

  5. Remove from heat and drain.

  6. Cut the meat into small pieces.

  7. Remove all bones.

  8. Skin the tongue.

Set and serve

  1. Season the minced meat with 1 teaspoon white pepper, ¾ teaspoon powdered mace, ¼ teaspoon powdered nutmeg, and ¼ teaspoon cayenne. Mix well.

  2. Press the meat into a brawn tin while warm.

  3. Place a heavy weight on the lid.

  4. Store in a cool place overnight.

  5. Dip the mold in boiling water.

  6. Turn out the brawn.

  7. Serve with vinegar and mustard.

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. Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  3. White pepper + macetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,695 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

  4. White pepper + nutmegtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,375 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Pepper + macetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,257 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

Pepper and mace barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,257 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Pig's head and feet
Provide collagen-rich meat and connective tissue that gel and bind the brawn as it cooks.
Saltpetre
Cures the meat, keeping it pink and giving it a cured flavour during the long rub.
Common salt
Draws out moisture and seasons the meat during curing, helping it firm up.
Moist sugar
Balances the salt with sweetness and softens the harsh edge of the cure.

The step that matters

Boil until the meat separates from the bones. Stopping too early leaves the meat clinging to bone, while overcooking turns it mushy. Gentle simmering breaks down collagen so the juices set into a firm jelly when cooled.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, pepper, mace, nutmeg):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Allspicefits better
  3. Clovefits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, pepper, mace, nutmeg. 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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