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Brawn of Ox Cheek

A gelatinous dish made from ox cheek, herbs, vegetables, and pork and ham, set in a mold.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Turnip and carrot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,002 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Brawn of Ox Cheek

Ingredients

Directions

Braise the meat

  1. Place the ox cheek, herbs, onions, shallots, turnip, and carrot in a saucepan.

  2. Cover with enough water and simmer for 5 to 6 hours until the meat is soft.

  3. Remove the bones, herbs, and vegetables from the pot.

Set the brawn

  1. Add salt and pepper to taste.

  2. Stir in the diced fat pork and lean ham.

  3. Simmer for another 15 minutes.

  4. Pour the mixture into a mold.

  5. Let it cool until set.

  6. Turn it out onto a dish.

  7. Garnish with curly parsley.

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. Turnip + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Shallot + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together202 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Clove + peppertop 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. Shallot + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,677 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Ox cheek
Supplies the meat that becomes tender during long simmering and forms the body of the brawn.
Fat pork
Adds richness and fat that give the brawn a smooth, moist texture.
Lean ham
Adds savory, meaty flavor to the set mixture.
Onions
Contribute savory sweetness and aroma to the cooking liquid.

The step that matters

Letting the mixture cool until set. The brawn sets as gelatin released from the cheek and bones cools. Turning it out too early can cause it to collapse, so it needs to chill fully before unmolding.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (shallot, turnip, clove, carrot, pepper, pork, ham):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Parsnipfits better
  3. Mustardfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against shallot, turnip, clove, carrot, pepper, pork, ham. 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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