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Directions for Making Souse

Souse is a pickled pig's feet, snouts, hocks, tails or ears simmered in vinegar and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: White wine and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,832 recipes. Both carry myrcene, which smells balsamic, herbaceous. The science ↓

Directions for Making Souse

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Clean the pigs feet, snouts, hocks, tails, or ears thoroughly.

  2. Place them in a kettle and cover with cold water.

  3. Boil until the meat can be easily removed from the bones.

  4. Remove the meat from the bones and return it to the boiling water.

Season and set

  1. Add enough white wine vinegar to achieve a nice sour taste.

  2. Mix in the granulated sugar and pickled tongue seasoning.

  3. Boil for about 15 minutes, then remove from heat.

  4. Pour the mixture into square tin pans and let it set for 24 hours.

  5. If desired, add chopped lemon and onions before boiling.

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. White wine + lemontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,832 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

  2. White wine + vinegartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,776 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. White wine + oniontop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,535 recipes

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

  4. Vinegar + oniontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,226 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Vinegar + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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

What each ingredient does

Pigs feet, snouts, hocks, tails or ears
Provide the meat and gelatinous connective tissue that firms the souse as it cools.
White wine vinegar
Adds the sour flavour and helps preserve the pickled meat.
Granulated sugar
Balances the sharpness of the vinegar with a touch of sweetness.
Pickled tongue seasoning
Supplies the main seasoning that gives the souse its characteristic flavour.

The step that matters

Remove from heat after the 15-minute boil and pour before it cools too far. Pig's feet are rich in collagen, which releases gelatin during simmering. Gelatin is what lets the liquid set into a firm jelly once chilled, so the mixture must be poured while still fluid and left undisturbed to set.

Swap the lemon

The recipe marks lemon as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, white wine, vinegar, sugar, onion):

  1. Plumfits better
  2. Grapefits better
  3. Applefits about as well
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, white wine, vinegar, sugar, onion. 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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