Wiktionary
n. (context US English) brawn (terrine)
Wikipedia
Head cheese or brawn is a cold cut that originated in Europe. A version pickled with vinegar is known as souse. Head cheese is not a dairy cheese, but a terrine or meat jelly made with flesh from the head of a calf or pig, or less commonly a sheep or cow, and often set in aspic. The parts of the head used vary, but the brain, eyes, and ears are usually removed. The tongue, and sometimes the feet and heart, may be included. It can also be made from quality trimmings from pork and veal, adding gelatin to the stock as a binder.
Head cheese may be flavored with onion, black pepper, allspice, bay leaf, salt, and vinegar. It is usually eaten cold or at room temperature.
Historically, meat jellies were made of the cleaned (all organs removed) head of the animal, which was simmered to produce stock, a peasant food made since the Middle Ages. When cooled, the stock congeals because of the natural gelatin found in the skull. The aspic may need additional gelatin, or more often, reduction to set properly.
Head cheese may refer to:
- Head cheese, also known as brawn, a terrine usually made from the head of a pig or calf and set in aspic
- A slang term for smegma in many English speaking countries
- A short-lived professional wrestling tag team between Al Snow and Steve Blackman
- The original name for 1974's The Texas Chain Saw Massacre
Usage examples of "head cheese".
Sister Antolina lying in the convent bed, her guts trussed up, her arms akimbo and waiting for the Resurrection, waiting, waiting for life without hernia, without intercourse, without sin, without evil, meanwhile nibbling a few animal crackers, a pimento, some fancy olives, a little head cheese.
Fairbanks - so that son of a bitch who'd copped Dortmunder's ring was the guy himself, the head cheese - had given the cop a capsule version of his legal situation, and it came out exactly the way Gus had described it to Dortmunder, except with the added wrinkle that Max Fairbanks was in violation of the court order in re that house there, and didn't want anybody to know about it.
The kitchens turned out head cheese by the ton and I resolved that next year we'd have some sausage-making machinery.
I told her the bread and wonderful head cheese had saved our lives, that we hadn't found what we had hoped to find, and that we were taking just one thing, a book that we wanted to have a good look at because it might tell us something.
McVey always seems to put the things no one wants, like sweetbreads and Scotch eggs and sheep's brains and head cheese.
Jesus Christ Himself didn't, so Stamp ate a piece of Ella's head cheese to show there were no bad feelings and set out to find Paul D.