To Pickle Tongues for Boiling
Ingredients
Directions
Cure
Cut off the root of the tongue, leaving some kernel and fat.
Sprinkle salt on the tongue and let it drain overnight.
Mix 1 cup of common salt, 1 cup of coarse sugar, and ½ cup of saltpetre.
Rub the mixture into the tongue daily for a week.
Add another heaped cup of salt after the first week.
Write the date on parchment. Tie the parchment on the tongue.
Finish and cook
Smoke or dry the tongues as preferred.
Soak the tongue for 3-4 hours before cooking if it is hard.
Boil the tongue until extremely tender, about 5 hours.
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
- The main meat; long cooking turns its tough muscle tender.
- Common salt
- Draws out moisture and seasons the meat while it cures.
- Coarse sugar
- Balances the salt and softens the savoury flavour of the cure.
- Saltpetre
- Sets the characteristic pink colour in the cured meat.
The step that matters
Boil the tongue until extremely tender. Tongue is a tough, muscle-heavy cut, and it only becomes tender after long, slow cooking. Stopping early leaves it chewy, so the cook should test for tenderness rather than rely on the clock alone.
“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.