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Brawn, with Brawn Sauce

A jellied meat dish made by boiling a pig's head, picking out the meat, and setting it in its own stock.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Brawn, with Brawn Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the head

  1. Boil the pig's head until the flesh can be removed from the bones.

  2. Lift the head out, remove the bones, skin the tongue, bone the ears, and cut all into small pieces.

Make the stock

  1. Put the bones back into the saucepan with 2 pints of the boiling liquid.

  2. Add the sliced onion, mace, cloves, allspice, peppercorns, bay leaves, and thyme.

  3. Bring to a boil.

  4. Simmer uncovered for 30 minutes until reduced by half a pint.

  5. Strain the stock, return it to the saucepan with the cut meat, and bring to a boil again.

  6. Taste and adjust seasoning if necessary.

Set and serve

  1. Pour into a wet mold and let it stand until firm.

  2. Turn out onto a dish and garnish with 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. Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Allspice + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,077 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Clove + thymetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,108 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Allspice + parsleytop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,289 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Pig's head
Supplies the meat, skin and connective tissue that give the brawn its body and set.
Bones (in the method)
Release gelatin into the simmering liquid, helping the stock set firm when chilled.
Onion
Adds aromatic sweetness and savoury depth to the stock.
Peppercorns
Add gentle, warm spice that flavours the stock as it simmers.

The step that matters

Simmer until reduced by half a pint. Reducing the stock concentrates its flavour and natural gelatin. If it is too dilute, the brawn will not set firm when cooled, so the stock must be seasoned after reduction.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, clove, allspice, thyme, parsley, beef):

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Winter savoryfits better
  3. Nutmegfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, clove, allspice, thyme, parsley, beef. 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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