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Baked Tongue with Bacon and Cow Heel

A slow‑baked dish of tongue, bacon, cow heel, and aromatics simmered in brandy, ale, and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Ginger and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,038 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Baked Tongue with Bacon and Cow Heel

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the pan

  1. Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).

  2. In a baking pan, place the thick slice of bacon and cover it with lean veal or beef steak.

  3. Trim and curl the tongue to fit the pan, placing it on top of the meat.

  4. Add the flesh of the parboiled cow heel over the tongue, then top with another slice of bacon and more beef or veal.

  5. Season with black pepper, ginger, cloves, bay leaf, carrot, and onions.

  6. Pour in the brandy or sherry, old ale, and water.

Bake and set

  1. Cover the pan and bake for three hours.

  2. Remove the cover and place a board with a weight on top until cold.

  3. The next day, dip the pan in hot water to loosen the meat and turn it out.

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. Ginger + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Ginger + carrottop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,377 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Clove + carrottop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,873 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Pepper + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Tongue
Forms the main body of the dish, becoming tender during the long, moist braise.
Cow heel
Its gelatine sets as the dish cools, binding the meat into a firm, sliceable mass.
Bacon
Adds fat and savoury flavour that seeps into the meat during the long bake.
Veal or beef steak
Provides meaty bulk and flavour, keeping the layers moist as they cook.
Old ale
Adds depth and malty flavour to the cooking liquid while helping tenderise the meat.
Brandy or sherry
Adds aromatic depth and a little acidity to the braising liquid.

The step that matters

Covered baking and pressing until cold. The pan must stay covered during the long bake so the meat braises in its liquid rather than drying out. Cooling under weight lets the gelatine from the cow heel set and bind the layers, so the dish holds together when turned out.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, pepper, ginger, clove, carrot, brandy):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Parsnipfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, pepper, ginger, clove, carrot, brandy. 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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