R E C I P E S
Fromage de Tête (Headcheese)
Like so much other charcuterie, the varied forms of headcheese surely originate in the need to make quick use of spare parts at pig-slaughtering time. The basics for headcheese are that whole heads, extra skin, and feet are boiled up, and the highly gelatinous bouillon sets to a firm consistency that temporarily protects and preserves the contents. The cuts in question impart the rich porky flavors and textures that are essential to headcheese. In France, certain kinds of headcheese, differing from region to region, are called fromage de tête while others are called hure, literally “head.” In technical books, hure contains less gelée than fromage de tête, and a third preparation, museau, consists of compact layers of cooked pig’s head with hardly any gelée at all, more or less the same as tête roulée. (Excellent with both museau and tête roulée, with their large quantity of rind, are a mustard vinaigrette with chopped parsley and paper-thin slices of onion, the latter two items, especially the onion, cut at the last minute.) The execution of any of these depends on who’s making them. Fromage de tête is the specialty of Gilles Verot in Paris — he once won the Jean Carmet trophy for the best in France — who also makes hure pistaché. His fromage contains head, but his hure is filled with only tongues and garnished with pistachios. Even so, its soul lies in the long-simmered jus and gelées that form its base.
Your own version will depend on the ingredients you can find and the amount of gelée you incorporate. It’s common anywhere in France to throw in extra tongues for meatier texture; otherwise, the headcheese is dominated by skin and other gelatinous components. Because a pig’s head is not easy to find and you may not want to deal with one, the recipe that follows is based on hure, but half a pig’s head could replace the feet or hock. The important thing, for genuine flavor and a toothsome but melting gelée, is to put in some combination of head, tongues, hocks, feet. Once the meats are done, home recipes call for simply cooling them in the cooking liquid in a mold. Charcutiers further cook the mixture inside the mold, as below, which improves keeping and makes the headcheese easier to slice. Brining the pork beforehand, as called for in the recipe, yields the best flavor and texture, but it’s not absolutely essential.
5 whole fresh pork tongues (about 2 pounds or 1 kg before brining)
1 meaty pork hock (about 2 pounds or 1 kg before brining) or 3 pig’s feet plus ¾ pound (350 gr) pork shoulder, preferably échine
more pork rinds, if available
about 3 quarts (3 liters) Brine for Small Items
2 onions (about 300 gr), quartered
1 carrot (75 gr)
½ stalk celery (75 gr)
1 small bay leaf
1 or 2 branches fresh thyme
1 clove
a dozen parsley stems
1½ to 3 envelopes (10 to 20 gr) Knox powdered gelatin (each envelope contains 7 gr), as needed
¼ cup (50 ml) white wine
salt
1 shallot, finely chopped, making about 3 tablespoons (30 gr)
½ small clove garlic, finely chopped (for the record, if you multiply to make larger amounts, the metric measure is 1.3 gr)
black pepper
Put the tongues, hock, or other meats (the rind, too, if you already have it, as a way of keeping it) in the brine, keeping them fully submerged by weighting them with a ceramic plate that will fit into the container of brine — there should be plenty of brine so the meats move loosely within it. Cover and refrigerate. Keep the meats in the brine, refrigerated, for 5 to 7 days. Before you start the headcheese, soak the brined meats overnight in cold water in the refrigerator to reduce the saltiness, and drain.
Choose a pot that will snugly fit the brined meats, onions, carrots, celery, bay leaf, thyme, clove, and parsley; and add them. Pour in cold water just to cover and put a plate on top to keep the meats submerged. Bring to a boil and immediately reduce the temperature to the gentlest simmer, so that the cooking liquid will not turn cloudy. Simmer 2½ to 3 hours, until the meats are tender but not mushy. Cool, cover, and refrigerate the full pot overnight.
The next day, first notice whether the jus has set firmly or delicately. Then put the pot over low heat to melt the cooking liquid. Take the pot off the burner and remove the meats. Trim the tongues of their rind and gristle, and retrieve the meat from the hock, setting aside the skin and discarding the bones. The yield should be around ¾ pound (325 gr) of tongue meat and ½ pound (225 gr) of hock or a similar total (about 1¼ pounds, 550 gr) from the feet and shoulder meat.
Strain the cooking liquid, and skim the grease from the surface. Measure out 2 cups (450 ml) of the liquid, and set the rest aside for another purpose (such as to make a sauce for a future pork roast). It’s unlikely (unless you started with a gelatinous broth or used a high proportion of head and feet to water) that the refrigerated cooking liquid was quite firm enough, but if it was fairly well set, whisk just 10 grams of powdered gelatin into ½ cup (125 ml) of the warm cooking liquid, and add it back to the rest along with the wine. If the cooking liquid was barely set, 20 grams of gelatin might be necessary. After whisking in the gelatin, take the precaution of pouring a few drops of the liquid onto a plate and refrigerating it for 5 to 10 minutes to confirm that it sets firmly enough to peel off the plate easily and yet remains tender enough to melt on the tongue. Taste the gelée and add salt as needed, remembering that cold preparations call for higher seasoning.
To the meats, add the shallot, garlic, and a few grinds of black pepper, and mix. Pour the meats into a mold of appropriate size, approximately 1 liter — an ovenproof glass loaf pan has the advantage that you can see what’s going on inside — and pour in the desired amount of gelée (2/3 cup or 150 ml will hold things together; twice that is typical). If you want, top the whole with a layer of cooked rind placed skin side up (you can choose to eat it or not), and then, to improve keeping and slicing, cover well with parchment and set a small nonreactive roasting pan on top to prevent the contents from floating above the sides of the loaf pan. Place the whole thing in a 350° F (175° C) oven for approximately 20 minutes, until a thermometer registers 160° F (70° C), or until, when you insert a skewer for half a minute and then quickly place it on your bottom lip, it feels almost burning hot. Cool without removing the parchment and roasting pan. Then remove roasting pan and refrigerate. Serves perhaps 8 to 10.
From The Art of Eating Cookbook
