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To Cure Beef Tongues

A method of curing beef tongues in a sugar‑salt molasses brine, smoking, and storing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and molasses are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,225 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

To Cure Beef Tongues

Ingredients

Directions

Make the brine

  1. Boil the brown sugar, salt, molasses, red peppers, and salt water together.

  2. Skim the mixture well.

  3. Cool the mixture.

Cure and smoke

  1. Pack 12 tongues in a large jar.

  2. Pour the cold brine over the tongues.

  3. Put a weight on the tongues and let them remain for 10 to 12 days.

  4. Take out the tongues and drain them.

  5. Smoke the tongues for about 2 days.

  6. Dry the tongues moderately.

  7. Store the tongues in a flour sack in a dry place.

Cook and serve

  1. When ready to use, boil the tongue in a pot of water for 6 to 8 hours, adding more water as needed to keep it covered.

  2. Let the tongue cool.

  3. Do not skin the tongue until needed for 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. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Molasses + peppertop 31% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together897 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Sugar + peppertop 32% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together19,401 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Sugar and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 19,401 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

Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and helps flavor the cure.
Salt
Preserves the meat and draws moisture out during curing.
Molasses
Adds deep flavor and color to the cured meat.

The step that matters

Put a weight on the tongues and let them remain for 10 to 12 days. The tongues must stay fully submerged in the brine for the whole cure. Any part left exposed to air can spoil or dry unevenly, so the weight keeps the meat under the liquid.

“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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