Salt Tongue
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare and cure
Wash and scrape the tongue, then dry it thoroughly.
Mix common salt and saltpetre to tub the tongue for 24 hours.
Rub the tongue with salt and sugar to create a brine.
Ensure the brine covers the tongue and let it sit for 14 days, turning occasionally.
Finish
After brining, boil or dry the tongue for preservation.
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
What each ingredient does
- Tongue
- Is the meat being cured, so its texture and flavour develop through salting and brining.
- Coarse sea salt
- Draws moisture out of the meat and preserves it while the cure works.
- Saltpetre
- Helps cure the meat, giving it a pink colour and extra preservation.
- Sugar
- Balances the harshness of the salt and adds a mild sweetness to the cure.
The step that matters
Keep the brine covering the tongue. Any part left out of the brine can spoil or cure unevenly over the long rest. Turning the tongue helps the cure reach 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.
You might also like
Tomato Soup526 recipes
Brown Bread461 recipes
Mutton Broth292 recipes
Yorkshire Pudding264 recipesThe free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.