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Tonbridge Brawn

A preserved pig head made with saltpetre, sugar, spices, and boiled with herbs and vegetables.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,686 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Tonbridge Brawn

Ingredients

Directions

Cure the head

  1. Split open the pig's head.

  2. Remove the brain and bones.

  3. Strew the inside with coarse sea salt.

  4. Let it drain overnight.

  5. Clean the ears and feet.

  6. Wipe off brine.

  7. Place in a large pan.

  8. Rub the ears and feet with saltpetre mixed with sugar.

  9. After 12 hours, add coarse sea salt.

  10. Pour vinegar over them.

  11. Turn in the pickle daily for a week.

  12. Wash off the ears and feet.

Prepare and season

  1. Boil for about 1.5 hours.

  2. Bone the feet while warm.

  3. Trim the gristle from the ears.

  4. Mix grated nutmeg, mace, cayenne, and cloves.

  5. Wash the head. Wipe it.

  6. Flatten it on a board.

  7. Cut some flesh from the thickest parts.

  8. Season with spices.

  9. Intermix with the ears and feet.

Roll and cook

  1. Roll tightly. Bind with tape.

  2. Wrap in a thin pudding cloth. Tie securely at both ends.

  3. Place in a braising pan or suitable vessel with bones, herbs, onions, celery, carrots, peppercorns, and enough cold water to cover.

  4. Boil gently for 4 hours.

  5. Let cool in the liquid.

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. Nutmeg + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Nutmeg + macetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

  5. Clove + celerytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-decalactone (peach, creamy).

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

What each ingredient does

Pig's head
Forms the bulk of the brawn, giving meat and gelatine that set as it cools.
Saltpetre
Cures the meat and helps it keep its pink colour during curing.
Sugar
Balances the salt in the cure and softens the savour of the meat.
Coarse sea salt
Draws out moisture and preserves the meat during the curing stage.
Vinegar
Adds acidity to the pickle, helping to preserve and sharpen the flavour.
Onions
Add aroma and savour to the cooking liquid that flavours the meat.

The step that matters

Boil gently for 4 hours. A gentle simmer lets the connective tissue slowly break down into gelatine without toughening the meat. A hard boil can make the meat tough and cloudy, and the brawn may then fail to set.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, vinegar, nutmeg, pepper, clove, onion, celery):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Allspicefits better
  3. Cardamomfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, vinegar, nutmeg, pepper, clove, onion, celery. 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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