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Head Cheese

A cold terrine made from boiled pig head and feet, seasoned, chopped, and fried or served cold.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and sage match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,388 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Head Cheese

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the meat

  1. Boil the pig's head and feet until the meat is tender and separates easily from the bones.

  2. While warm, chop the meat finely and season with salt, pepper, and sage to taste.

  3. Place the chopped meat in a strong bag or dish and press it down with a weight.

  4. Let it cool.

Slice and serve

  1. Once cooled, cut into slices.

  2. Roll slices in flour and fry in lard until golden brown, or serve cold.

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

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

  2. Sage + flourtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,115 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Parts of a pig's head
Provides the meat and connective tissue that bind the terrine together when chilled.
Pig's feet
Adds gelatin from collagen, which helps the chopped meat set firm when cooled.
Lard for frying
Conducts heat and promotes browning on the floured slices as they fry.

The step that matters

Pressing the chopped meat while it cools. Pressing while the meat is still warm lets the gelatin released from the bones set the pieces into a single cohesive block. Without even pressure, the terrine can crumble when sliced.

Swap the sage

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

  1. Jalapenofits better
  2. Turmericfits better
  3. Parsleyfits about as well
  4. Sagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, flour. 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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