Hog's head cheese

This is just the recipe to use up those pesky hog's heads that are left lying around after a "boucherie' " is over and all the good parts are gone .

My Mom would say " We use up everything but the squeal " when it came to hog killing and food preparation ...

Cajun Hog's Head Cheese

Ingredients:
1 large hog's head or two medium sized ones . Provide your own or ask the local butcher .
OK ...if you can't get a head then substitute 2 1/2 - 3 lbs. Boston butt(it won't be quite as good but will do)
1 or 2 pigs feet (this is for the collagen
10 cups water
1 tablespoon salt
3/4 lb. onions , chopped
1 tablespoon dried parsley flakes
1 tablespoons dried celery flakes
1 bunch green onions , tops and bottoms , chopped fine
1 teaspoon black pepper
1 teaspoon red pepper
2 bay leaves
1 tablespoon Kitchen Bouquette

Clean the head by removing the eyes, ears and brains . Saw into 4 pieces .

Add all ingredients to your stock pot , bring to a slow boil ...and let everything cook down until very tender and meat begins to fall off the bones .
Remove meat from water. when cooled a bit cut up / chop meat fine .
Strain the water and return all the chopped meat to the liquid , bring to a boil , adjust seasonings to your taste , boil the liquid an additional 30 - 45 minutes to thicken if needed .
Let cool and pour into loaf pan(s) . 1 large or two small Chill thoroughly , turn out on a serving dish and serve with crackers and /or with boudin .
Note - warm the loaf pan in warm water to help unstick the head cheese when you turn it out . I like to mould it in pyrex loaf pans with snap on plastic covers .
Very tasty stuff .

A local market makes a version of this but with chicken meat ...
they decided to market it as "Chicken Glace' " ... I guess calling it
"Chicken Head Cheese" didn't sound so appealing ... I have this mental picture of a pot full of boiling chicken heads and feet going on in the back ...Parts is Parts and you gotta do something with em ! Chicken Glace' ....yeah that's the ticket !
Gary

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by gwpercle

(s) ... I guess calling it "Chicken Head Cheese" didn't sound so appealing ... I have this mental picture of a pot full of boiling chicken heads and feet going on in the back ...Parts is Parts and you gotta do something with em ! Chicken Glace' ....yeah that's the ticket !
Gary

---

The thought of a pot full of boiling quartered pig's head with eyeballs, ears, and brains doesn't sound very appealing either.:shock:

I was brought up on head cheese , souse and such. I dearly love real mince meat pie. I haven’t had hogs for 20yrs. A friend who lives local kept a few just for family and his mother made the head cheese and mince meat. She cold packed mince meat too and always kept me tuned up. My wife would make the pies but wouldn’t eat them. Sadly Ma passed and was cut off. Past fall I did a job down in WVa. and lady made me a pie and gave me 5lb loaf head cheese. The store bought stuff is a joke. People that wouldn’t eat the real McCoy because of what it’s made of will eat the store bought stuff. That way they know what they are getting, yea nose holes and *** holes with maybe an ear or two thrown in for texture.

I like it on crackers with a cold beer and a dash of hot sauce. I try to get some homade when i go to Louisiana to visit my kinfolks.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by curdog

I like it on crackers with a cold beer and a dash of hot sauce. I try to get some homade when i go to Louisiana to visit my kinfolks.

---

Now that is meal truly fit for a king !

Like just about anything ... home made has store bought beat all to hell and back !
Gary

Dad made hog's head cheese every year. I remember him using the old butcher's saw to cut the head. He pressure cooked it in batches in a 12 qt. Bones were so soft you could mash them between thumb and forefinger. Our dogs loved them. Chop everything up fine with fresh garlic and onions, add the seasonings, pour in loaf pans and let set. Big slab of that and a big slab of onion on a couple of slices of bread, heaven!

i love it,the only store bought ive found eatable is zeigler's they make hot and mild,i sure would like to find some good homemade

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Chad5005

i love it,the only store bought ive found eatable is zeigler's they make hot and mild,i sure would like to find some good homemade

---

Best Stop Food Market in Scott , Louisiana ... 615 LA 93 ...about 1 mile down the road from the Cock-Pit bar and cock fighting establishment . As good as homemade ...they make their own Cracklins , Andouille , Boudin and Smoked Boudin ...honestly the Head Cheese is better than what I can make...and a lot easier to get.
Don't go into the Cock-Pit on Sat. night ...they fight roosters in the back cock fighting pit and it gets raided every now and again...something about gambling not in a Casino being illegal ...Go Figure !

I just checked and they have a web site now... you can order stuff and they will ship it to you . To GA. they can do 2 day ! That's good in a way ...but then you don't have an excuse to stop in the Cock-Pit for cold beer and to watch a cock fight !
Gary

well they wife and i went on in to town saturday and got all the ingredients for the hog head cheese,we got started on it about 8 pm and got every thing done and poured into loaf pans by 2 am,we used the boston butt and 2 pigs feet,we used ground red pepper this time but on the next one we'll used ground red pepper and red pepper flakes to get the heat up to where we like it.it has a very good taste and wasnt bad to make.ill post a pic in a minute

Attachment 266722

the wife and i make our own sausage and pork boubin,next were trying seafood boudin with shrimp,crab and fish

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Drm50

I was brought up on head cheese , souse and such. I dearly love real mince meat pie. I haven’t had hogs for 20yrs. A friend who lives local kept a few just for family and his mother made the head cheese and mince meat. She cold packed mince meat too and always kept me tuned up. My wife would make the pies but wouldn’t eat them. Sadly Ma passed and was cut off. Past fall I did a job down in WVa. and lady made me a pie and gave me 5lb loaf head cheese. The store bought stuff is a joke. People that wouldn’t eat the real McCoy because of what it’s made of will eat the store bought stuff. That way they know what they are getting, yea nose holes and *** holes with maybe an ear or two thrown in for texture.

---

Same for me! Every now and then My wife and I drive about 1 hour northeast of us to a small town that has a real German Butcher shop / Restaurant!... we get there for lunch and Have a nice German meal and then go home with a whole bunch of goodies from the butcher shop! Souse, Headcheese and Real Weisswurst and Blood Sausage!

There oughtta be a law against you guys posting stuff like this.
Never heard of it before, Now I gotta make some and try it.

Local butcher shop goes thru a lot of hogs.
Bet they don't save any heads or feet so i should be able to get some free.
That stuff just isn't done up here !!!!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by gwpercle

My Mom would say " We use up everything but the squeal " when it came to hog killing and food preparation ...

---

Mom should have saved that too, so she could make oinkment to put on minor scrapes and sunburns..

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by semtav

Bet they don't save any heads or feet so i should be able to get some free.

---

Hog heads are the main thing used in true, old school, real Mexican tamales.
Here, making one disappear is no problem.

We never raised hogs commercially,but we did raise them for our own use,and my Uncle (Dad's brother in-law") would always take the heads for his Mother, so I assume she made it. I have ate the store bought souse,and like it. I find it to taste a little like pickled pig's feet, which I haven't had in years. A world of warning for all you head cheese lovers, especially you Texans..Beware of any crazy hippie photographers trying to lure you to his home with the promise of some head cheese made by his brother. LOL

Some 55+ years ago, I remember my German Grandmother call it 'stoltz', and we ate it cold with a little catsup and fresh rye bread. I learned early on, not to disagree with Grandma, never worked out very good for me? Tom

couldnt hold me down and force it into my mouth:coffeecom. make my pig eating loins chops ham and bacon please. Sounds about as appetizing as saving the silver skin off of a deer and grinding into a mush with a bit of scrap meat:kidding: Maybe if shtf and the world was ending id eat jellied meat before your brother but thats about it. I guess though, some animals even eat afterbirth. Looks kind of the same!!!!!!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by gwpercle

Now that is meal truly fit for a king !

Like just about anything ... home made has store bought beat all to hell and back !
Gary

---

MOST of the time homemade is the best but there are exceptions.

Growing up my mother made ketchup. It was awful. I can't describe how awful without getting perma-banned from this forum.

Almost nightmare inducing kind of awful.

Aaaaarrghaaaaaaa!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by 15meter

MOST of the time homemade is the best but there are exceptions.

Growing up my mother made ketchup. It was awful. I can't describe how awful without getting perma-banned from this forum.

Almost nightmare inducing kind of awful.

Aaaaarrghaaaaaaa!

---

My Mom made home made mayonnaise ... She thought it was better but my brother and I would cry untill she bought a jar of Blue Plate for us . Blue Plate is still my favorite but the wife likes Hellmann's ... but I don't cry if she buys Hellmann's .
Gary

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Lloyd Smale

couldnt hold me down and force it into my mouth:!!

---

That's funny.

Let me guess--- you're not a big fan of rocky mountain oysters, or chitterlings either are ya?

+10 on Winger Eds comments. Mountain Oysters, Turkey Fries, Raw oysters, chitterlings, you're talking my language here.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by gbrown

+10 on Winger Eds comments. Mountain Oysters, Turkey Fries, Raw oysters, chitterlings, you're talking my language here.

---

Talking your language ... You relocated Cajun or East Texas Red Neck ?
Some folks just don't know what good eating is !
Dined on some sweet char grilled oysters in New Orleans last Sunday ... good !
Gary

You can have my share of hog intestines BLECH! Reek when cooking and they reek when cooked!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by gwpercle

Talking your language ... You relocated Cajun or East Texas Red Neck ?
Some folks just don't know what good eating is !
Dined on some sweet char grilled oysters in New Orleans last Sunday ... good !
Gary

---

Yeah, down in the marshes, about 20 miles from the Gulf. Not a Piney Wood rooter. Just live with the mosquitoes and hurricanes.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MaryB

You can have my share of hog intestines BLECH! Reek when cooking and they reek when cooked!

---

I'd heard about them all my life, but never had any.

So,,,, one time I got some, after consulting with a couple folks who claimed to like them.

I couldn't hang with cooking them. Fan in the window blowing outside & all. I couldn't finish the 'preparations' for this delicacy.
On top of that, I had to listen to a bunch of 'yackety-yak' from Mrs. Winger about how bad they stunk up the house for a couple of days.

Another one I couldn't get down is menudo-- that Mexican soup made from tripe.
It was like chewing on chunks of pork fat flavored bubble gum.

If you eat some good menudo, made with chitterlings and hominy, its good. I've had both bad and good. Cooked right, seasoned right, delish. The greasy, thin stuff they try to pass off for menudo is supposed to be THE cure for hangovers. Visualizing that with how I felt, at the time, all I can think of is prayers in front of the porcelain god.

Winger ed: cooking indoors is great, think of burners and coleman stoves to be used outside.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MaryB

You can have my share of hog intestines BLECH! Reek when cooking and they reek when cooked!

---

if its cut out or cut off when im field dressing it stays for the birds!! Ill eat back straps thank you. You guys that like rocky mountain oysters. Do you prefer them with hair or shaved??:kidding:

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Winger Ed.

I'd heard about them all my life, but never had any.


Another one I couldn't get down is menudo-- that Mexican soup made from tripe.
It was like chewing on chunks of pork fat flavored bubble gum.

---

Sounds like chewing on chicken soup made from 2+ year old layers, when the chickens got too old to lay eggs some of them ended up in the stock pot.

All day simmer and the meat had the consistency of shoe leather, the skin could have been used for vulcanizing inner tube patches. The kind of patch you used the special clamp to hold the patch on with the thermite cup that you placed on top and lit. Just awful stink but those patches held.

Yup, that skin could have been used for those kinds of patches.

But the stock was delicious, and the dumplings were heavenly.

So you fed the skin to the cat and watched it try and chew it up. The cat didn't have any better luck than us kids.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Winger Ed.

That's funny.

Let me guess--- you're not a big fan of rocky mountain oysters,

---

We grew up eating those, before we ever heard the term Rocky Mountain oysters.
When we were too little to wrestle the calves we were the powder monkeys.
We'd take them and put them on the branding pot and let them cook til they popped then ate the soft middle.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by gbrown

Yeah, down in the marshes, about 20 miles from the Gulf. Not a Piney Wood rooter. Just live with the mosquitoes and hurricanes.

---

Piney Woods Rooter ... I haven't heard that reference in a coons age but I think it may be my Momma's side of the family . She came to live with a Cajun Aunt in Louisiana , (my mom's mom passed when she was a little girl and her daddy couldn't take care of all the kids) she grew up and lived in Louisiana, after WWII she met and married my Cajun Dad and so by marriage my mom became Cajun . She could even speak Cajun French .
I was grown before I knew she was East Texas Piney Woods born ... she didn't talk about that side of the family very much but her older sister, who still lived in E. Texas , was a hoot ...drank beer and cursed like a sailor ... she was my favorite aunt... Piney Woods Rooters , May God Bless Them All !
Gary

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by hc18flyer

Some 55+ years ago, I remember my German Grandmother call it 'stoltz', and we ate it cold with a little catsup and fresh rye bread. I learned early on, not to disagree with Grandma, never worked out very good for me? Tom

---

Yeah. That is the German version of hog's head cheese. Same concept, very different taste.

Will have to compare this one to my brother's recipe. Always looking for a good hog's head cheese recipe. Now do you have a good boudin recipe?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by gwpercle

Piney Woods Rooter ... I haven't heard that reference in a coons age but I think it may be my Momma's side of the family . She came to live with a Cajun Aunt in Louisiana , (my mom's mom passed when she was a little girl and her daddy couldn't take care of all the kids) she grew up and lived in Louisiana, after WWII she met and married my Cajun Dad and so by marriage my mom became Cajun . She could even speak Cajun French .
I was grown before I knew she was East Texas Piney Woods born ... she didn't talk about that side of the family very much but her older sister, who still lived in E. Texas , was a hoot ...drank beer and cursed like a sailor ... she was my favorite aunt... Piney Woods Rooters , May God Bless Them All !
Gary

---

Yeah, Piney Wood Rooter is definitely a different breed. I've known hundreds of them. If you follow their law, they give you the shirt off their back or help you in any way. Not to their liking, short shrift. Law abiding(except for game or alcohol laws), Bible thumping, Good people. Some fall off the wagon, at times. Good, solid people, just don't like a lot of interference in their way of life. Very clan like. Look up the Shelby County War. Like the Hatfield and McCoys.