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To Pickle Cheeks of Bacon and Hams

A cured and smoked bacon and ham dish pickled with salt, sugar, saltpetre, pepper, and bran.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and pork are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 22,121 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

To Pickle Cheeks of Bacon and Hams

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Mix the common salt, coarse sugar, saltpetre, and black pepper (if using) in a bowl.

  2. Rub the mixture thoroughly over the pork, ensuring all parts are covered.

Cure

  1. Place the pork in a deep pickling pan with the rind side down and cover it well with the salt mixture.

  2. Let the pork cure for 4 to 5 weeks, turning it occasionally.

  3. After curing, drain the pork and rub it with bran.

Smoke

  1. Hang the pork in a chimney over a wood fire to smoke for one month.

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 + porktop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,121 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

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

  3. Sugar + porktop 37% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,579 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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

Common salt
Draws out moisture and slows bacterial growth, preserving the pork during the cure.
Saltpetre
Helps preserve the meat and gives cured pork its characteristic pink colour.
Coarse sugar
Balances the harshness of the salt and adds a mellow sweetness to the cured meat.

The step that matters

Covering the pork fully with the salt mixture. Any area left uncovered can spoil or cure unevenly, because salt draws moisture out and inhibits bacteria only where it actually contacts the meat. Turning the pork during the cure keeps the salt in contact with every surface.

“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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