Name: Boar’s Head
Cuisine: United Kingdom
Ingredients: 2 onions, skinned and halved; mustard; red-currant jelly; 1 teaspoon each of thyme and sage, finely chopped plenty of salt and ground black pepper; cucumber optional; black olives optional; 3 bay leaves; the tongue, separate, plus another tongue or 2 sheep’s tongues; ½ bottle sweet sherry or madeira; 1 pig’s head, boned by the butcher; 2 teaspoons chopped parsley; bouquet garni; pimento optional; 12 cloves; 1 orange; 1 red apple; sweet chutney; 1 bottle red wine; 2 lb. (1 k.) diced lean pork; hard-boiled eggs; macaroni; 4 carrots; 1 teaspoon powdered mace; 2 medium onions, minced; 1 teaspoon powdered ginger; 12 peppercorns

Preparation info

Difficulty
Complex

Appears in

The Cookery of England

By Elisabeth Ayrton

Published 1975

About

‘A royal dyshe for the Christmas Feast.’

This comes from Lancashire and dates from the late fifteenth century. It is translated and simplified here, but not altered except that a pig’s head must replace the boar’s, unless you order a boar’s head from France where ‘wild’ boars are bred in certain areas. The head is not pickled as in many recipes, as it is intended for a specific feast and is prepared only 5 or 6 days in advance. If well pickled with salt and saltpetre it will keep fo