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Collared Head

A preserved pork head cured with salt, saltpetre, sugar, white pepper, allspice, and boiled until tender.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: White pepper and allspice work together. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 272 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Collared Head

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the head

  1. Clean the pork head thoroughly, especially the ears, and remove the brains and black parts of the eyes.

  2. Remove the tongue, but salt it along with the head.

  3. Salt the head and tongue with coarse sea salt, saltpetre, and coarse sugar; rub it in well and let it sit for a week.

Cook and shape

  1. Boil the head until the meat separates from the bones and the skin from the tongue.

  2. Remove the meat as whole as possible and lay the broad side of one half to the narrow side of the other to form a square.

  3. Slit the tongue in half and lay the tip of one half to the root of the other; spread open the ears and the meat of the feet.

  4. Sprinkle a layer of white pepper and allspice over the meat, then roll it tightly in a cloth and bind with broad tape.

  5. Boil the wrapped meat until tender, about three hours.

  6. Press it down with a weight and do not remove the cloth until it is cold.

  7. Slice and serve cold, or fry in batter.

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 pepper + allspicetop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together272 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Pork + allspicetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,194 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

  3. Sugar + allspicetop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,938 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

  4. Pork + white peppertop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together791 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl butyrate (fruity, apple).

  5. Pork + sugartop 37% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,579 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

Pork head
Provides the meat and gelatinous skin that bind the collar together when cooled.
Coarse sea salt
Draws out moisture and seasons the meat during the week-long cure.
Saltpetre
Helps cure the meat and gives it its characteristic pink colour.
Coarse sugar
Balances the salt and softens the flavour of the cured meat.

The step that matters

Pressing the wrapped meat while it cools. Pressing while the meat cools lets the gelatin set and the layers fuse into a firm, sliceable collar. Removing the cloth early can leave it crumbly and misshapen.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pork, sugar, allspice):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Clovefits better
  3. Nutmegfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, sugar, allspice. 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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