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Pan Hams

A dish made from boiled hog head and feet, seasoned meat mixed with cornmeal, boiled into a stiff mush, sliced and fried.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and sage match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,485 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Pan Hams

Ingredients

Directions

Make the mixture

  1. Boil the hog's head and feet until the meat falls from the bones.

  2. Remove the meat and strain the cooking liquid, returning it to the pot.

  3. Chop the meat very finely and season with pepper, salt, spices, onion, thyme, sage, and parsley.

  4. Add the seasoned meat to the cooking liquid and stir in enough cornmeal to make a stiff mush.

  5. Boil for 10 minutes, stirring constantly.

Set and fry

  1. Pour the mixture into a deep pan and let it cool.

  2. Once cooled, cut into thin slices and fry.

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. Thyme + sagetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,485 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Sage + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,445 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + sagetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

What each ingredient does

Hog's head
Provides the meat and gelatin that help the mixture hold together as it cools.
Hog's feet
Adds gelatin from the bones and connective tissue, helping the mixture set firm when cooled.
Cornmeal
Thickens the cooking liquid into a stiff mush that sets and can be sliced.
Onion
Adds aromatic flavor to the seasoned meat.

The step that matters

Boil for 10 minutes, stirring constantly. Cornmeal settles and scorches on the bottom of the pot if not stirred, and it can thicken unevenly. Constant stirring keeps the starch dispersed so the mush cooks smoothly and sets evenly.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, thyme, sage, parsley):

  1. Carrotfits better
  2. Parsnipfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, thyme, sage, parsley. 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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