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To Collar Pig's Head

A preserved pig's head made into a meat jelly by boiling, seasoning, and setting in a skin.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,814 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

To Collar Pig's Head

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the head

  1. Scour the pig's head and ears thoroughly.

  2. Remove the hair, snout, eyes, and brains.

  3. Soak the head in water overnight.

  4. Drain the head and rub it with saltpetre and common salt.

  5. Cover the head with water and let it sit for two days.

Cook and set

  1. Wash the head well and boil until the bones come out.

  2. Remove the bones and chop the meat into 1-inch pieces.

  3. Season the meat with pepper and salt.

  4. Press the chopped meat into a pan lined with skin, then cover with another skin.

  5. Let it cool, then turn it out to form a brawn.

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 + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

What each ingredient does

Saltpetre
Cures the meat and helps it keep its pink colour and savoury flavour.
Common salt
Draws out moisture and seasons the meat during the curing period.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the flavour of the rich meat.

The step that matters

Boil until the bones come out. Boiling must be long enough to release gelatin from the bones and connective tissue, which is what lets the brawn set firm when cooled. Stopping too early leaves the meat loose and the set weak.

“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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