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Scrapple

A pork head broth thickened with cornmeal, formed into a loaf, sliced and fried for breakfast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Sage and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,388 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Scrapple

Ingredients

Directions

Make the scrapple base

  1. Boil the pig's head in 4 quarts of water with sage, salt, and pepper.

  2. Remove the meat from the bones, discarding the eyes, and chop it finely.

  3. Return the chopped meat to the boiling liquid.

  4. Add enough cornmeal to slightly thicken the mixture.

  5. Simmer for 2 hours, stirring often to prevent scorching.

Set and slice

  1. Rinse bread pans with cold water and pour the mixture into the pans.

  2. Set aside to harden until cold and stiff.

  3. Slice into pieces slightly more than ½ inch thick.

Fry and serve

  1. Fry the slices for breakfast, turning carefully with a spatula.

  2. Serve hot with a few drops of pepper vinegar at the table.

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. Sage + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Pig's head
Provides the meat and gelatin that give the scrapple its body and firm set.
Cornmeal
Thickens the cooking liquid so the mixture can hold its shape when chilled.

The step that matters

Stirring during the 2-hour simmer. Cornmeal and meat settle and stick to the bottom of the pot, so frequent stirring prevents scorching and keeps the texture even.

“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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