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A Collar of Brawn

A boiled pig head, feet, ears, and ox‑heels seasoned with salt, pepper, and bay leaves, formed into a collar shape.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and white pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 19% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,478 recipes. Both carry piperonal, which smells bitter, coconut. The science ↓

A Collar of Brawn

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare and cure

  1. Wash, scrape, and clean the pig's head, feet, and ears thoroughly.

  2. Soak them in a mixture of salt and water with saltpetre for 3 hours.

Cook and press

  1. Boil the pig's head, feet, ears, and ox-heels until the bones can be easily removed.

  2. Arrange the head around a mold and place the feet and small pieces in the center.

  3. Press it together while hot and weigh it down until it cools.

Finish

  1. Boil the brawn in enough liquid to cover it, adding salt, black and white pepper, and bay leaves for 30 minutes.

  2. Once cooled, pour the liquid over the 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 + white peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,478 recipes

    Shared aroma: piperonal (bitter, coconut).

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

What each ingredient does

Pig's head
Provides meat, skin and bone that release gelatin, helping the brawn set firm when cooled.
Pig's feet
Rich in collagen, which turns to gelatin and helps the brawn hold together when cold.
Ox-heels
Add extra collagen, producing gelatin that binds the meat and gives the set jelly.
Coarse sea salt
Seasons the meat and draws out moisture, helping to preserve it.
Saltpetre
Acts as a curing agent that helps preserve the meat and keep it pink.

The step that matters

Pressing the brawn while hot. Collagen in the bones and skin dissolves into liquid gelatin during boiling. As the mass cools under weight, that gelatin sets and binds the pieces together. If it is not pressed while hot, the pieces can separate and the set will be loose.

“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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