Name: Souse, or Hog’s Head Cheese
Yield: Serves 20 to 30
Cuisine: United States
Ingredients: 2 bay leaves, crushed; 4 shallots, chopped; 2 onions, chopped (1½ to 2 cups); 2 tablespoons (⅛ cup) white vinegar; fresh pig fat cut into ¼-inch-thick slices; 1 cup dry red wine; 1 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg; ½ teaspoon dried thyme; 4 pig’s feet; 1 hog’s head

Preparation info

Serves
20 to 30

Difficulty
Easy

Appears in

Hoppin John’s Lowcountry Cooking

By John Martin Taylor

Published 1992

About

Souse is a traditional Christmas dish both in Charleston and on Barbados, where so many of the city’s early settlers and slaves first lived. I put it out on New Year’s Day, before the hoppin’ john, with beer and crackers, to ward off the ill effects of the night before. Charleston Receipts notes, “Have butcher clean head and feet.”