Why it works: Pepper and ham are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 23% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,058 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓
Of Brawn
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the head and feet
Scald the calf's head until it is as white as possible.
Bone the calf's head and feet, then season them with coarse sea salt, Cayenne pepper, and fine spice.
Place the head and feet on a dish, turning them daily and rubbing with a little saltpetre and coarse sea salt for about one week in winter (less in summer).
Assemble and cook
When ready, cut the ham or gammon into long square pieces.
Beat the head and feet with a meat mallet, then layer the ham over the head and the feet over the ham.
Season the layers with fine spice, salt, and Cayenne pepper.
Roll it up tightly, wrap in cloth, and boil well.
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.
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Pepper + hamtop 23% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together6,058 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Calf's head
- Provides gelatine and lean meat that set the brawn into a firm, sliceable mass.
- Calf's feet
- Their collagen converts to gelatine during long cooking, helping the brawn set firmly when cooled.
- Saltpetre
- Cures the meat, helping it keep its pink colour and giving a distinctive cured flavour.
- Fat and lean ham or gammon
- Adds savoury, cured flavour and contrasting colour and texture through the rolled brawn.
The step that matters
Rolling and boiling the brawn. The rolled meat must be wrapped tightly and boiled gently for long enough that collagen breaks down into gelatine. Under-cooking leaves it tough and unable to set, while a hard boil can break the roll apart and toughen the meat.
“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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