Tongue - beef or pork - is a real find for the thrifty housewife. Since it is considered an offal, it is cheap. But the taste is in no way inferior to the meat of the first category. And in some respects even surpasses it. The tongue has a soft, delicate texture and an exquisite taste. Moreover, since this organ is a continuous muscle, it practically does not contain carbohydrates. But in its composition there are a lot of proteins and useful minerals. Among the latter, zinc is especially worth mentioning, which helps to produce natural insulin. Thus, this offal should be consumed more often by patients with diabetes. But zinc is more in beef tongue, but pork is known for its lecithin content, which is necessary for the normal functioning of nerve cells. There are no connective tissues in the offal, which means that it is perfectly digested and can serve as dietary food. In this article we will look at how to make a delicious pork tongue. Recipes for cooking, how long it takes to cook an offal to preserve its useful qualities, in which dishes you can add it - all this will be described below.
How to choose a good language. Product pretreatment
Many instructions on how to cook this dish begin with the words: "Take a boiled tongue and cut it ...". As if in this form the product is sold in a store! And in case you are a beginner culinary specialist, such a recipe will confuse you. Fortunately, the process of cooking the tongue is not at all complicated. True, quite long. But no matter what you are going to make from the tongue - soup, salad, jellied meat, bake it in the oven - first it should be properly prepared for cooking. In the store, give preference not to frozen, but chilled product. It is in it that the entire supply of vitamins and minerals is stored. Frozen tongue is only suitable for minced meat, but a good aspic will not work. But if you still purchased this product, you need to give it enough time to thaw. Any recipe for cooking a pig tongue involves a gradual defrosting. First move the product to the refrigerator. And then let the tongue lie in very cold water. It needs to be changed from time to time so that it does not heat up. After an hour and a half soaking, the tongue will be easier to clean. But in this case, you can not do without a brush.
Boiled pork tongue: recipe with photo
The initial processing of the offal directly affects the taste of the dish. To pork tongue turned out juicy, with a delicate smell, you need to know a few secrets. Do not clean the offal from the rough skin covering it. Leave this process for later when the language is completely cooked. Does it bother you that you couldn’t wipe your skin from dark spots by any efforts? Here's how to comply with sanitary standards. Fill the chilled tongue with water. After half an hour, drain the liquid. We pick up a new pan and set it to cook. When the water boils, wait a quarter of an hour. Salt and this water. Thus, all the dirt that has eaten into the fibers of the skin of the tongue will go away, and along with it the unpleasant smell of raw offal. We again collect clean cold water. And if you are going to cook soup from the tongue, then this will be your future soup. This time carefully remove the foam with a slotted spoon. So your soup will turn amber and transparent. No need to rush and cook the broth over high heat. Enough if he barely gurgles.
Cooking time
During heat treatment, the skin of the tongue becomes white and hard, like a rubber bag. It is difficult to guess whether the edible portion of the offal is sufficiently prepared. Therefore, many novice cooks are interested in the question: how much to cook pork tongue? Recipes do not give a clear answer. After all, cooking time depends not only on the size of the tongue, but also on the age of the animal. Only a very rough answer can be given. If a whole tongue weighs about 300-400 grams, then it most likely belonged to a young pig. Such an offal is cooked from one and a half to two hours. If the delicacy reaches a pound, then it is taken from an adult pig. Such a product requires longer cooking - about two and a half hours or even more. We remind you: do not rush and make a big fire under the pan. The tongue turns out to be tender and juicy when it is cooked for a long time on low heat. Readiness check so. Pull the tongue out of the pan onto a plate. We pierce with a knife in the thickest place. If colorless juice appears, then you can turn off the fire.
Some cooking rules
Any recipe for boiled pork tongue requires half an hour before being ready to put bay leaves, peeled carrots and parsley, half a potato of celery, onion in the broth. And that is regardless of whether you plan to use the broth or not. It’s just that these seasonings will give the language additional nuances of taste and aroma. Then, and not earlier, the broth needs to be salted. Immediately after you turn off the fire under the pan, you need to get your tongue out and dip it in cold water for five to ten minutes. From the temperature difference, the skin will lag behind the pulp, and it will be easy to cut. For some dishes, the tongue can be cut into slices and skinned, like sausages. But most recipes still require you to completely clear the product from a solid white shell. Tongue without skin is returned to the hot broth. Let him lie there for half an hour and pick up additional moisture into the fibers. So the product will become more delicate in taste.
Cooking in a slow cooker
As you can see, the process of heat treatment of the tongue itself is simple. But it takes considerable time. And the cook needs to constantly remove the foam from the broth. But we live in the 21st century! Modern kitchen devices will help us make a delicious boiled pork tongue. Recipes in the multicooker of this offal are very simple. We thoroughly wash and brush the tongue weighing 300 grams. Put it in the bowl of the multicooker. Immediately put vegetables there: sliced onions and carrots into four parts, as well as two whole cloves of garlic. Pour a liter of cold water. Lower the lid, turn on the "Extinguishing" program. After an hour and a half, add a bay leaf, two peas of pepper, salt and other spices to the bowl of the multicooker. If necessary, add water. We’ll start the Extinguishing program again, but this time for half an hour. After the sound signal we take out the tongue and lower it for ten minutes into ice water. Clean, let him lie in a hot broth.
Pork tongue salad: recipe with photo
Honestly, this offal is very tasty in itself. Slice it, serve with mustard or grated beets with horseradish. Great appetizer for Russian vodka! As for salads, the boiled tongue can be used in any recipe that uses meat or sausage. Try to make Olivier punchy in this way. That is, instead of sausage, cut the same amount of boiled tongue. You will see how the taste of the whole dish is transformed. No wonder the version of this salad is called "Olivier for the bourgeois." And here’s another recipe. It is called - "Salad of the tongue." Cut the boiled and chilled offal into small cubes. One hundred grams of prune will be filled with hot water. When the dried fruits are softened, select the seeds, and cut the flesh into pieces. Chop the onion in half rings, put in a bowl, salt and sprinkle with pepper, drizzle with vegetable oil and vinegar. Pickle about 10 minutes. Mix all the ingredients. Dress with mayonnaise. We spread the dish on lettuce leaves. Garnish with parsley leaves.
Jelly
A simple recipe for jellied pork tongue will help you create a crown appetizer on the festive table. We cook two pieces of this offal until cooked according to the method described above. We clean, cut into slices. Gelatin (20 g) is filled with an incomplete glass of cold boiled water. Peel the carrots and half the celery tuber. We lay out the slices of the tongue on the dish. Decorate with carrot stars and celery sticks. We take 350 milliliters of liquid from the broth in which the tongue was cooked. We filter it through cheesecloth. Beat egg white with a fork and pour into a hot broth. The color of the liquid immediately brightens. We put it on fire. After boiling, cook the broth for 3 minutes. Separately, we heat up the swollen gelatin in the mug. Knead until the yellow grains are completely dissolved. Pour into a hot broth. Knead. Pour the tongue dish with this liquid. We put in the cold.
Chinese braised tongue
The offal can be used not only as a cold snack, but also serve it as the main hot dish. First boil the tongue. Clean it from the skin. Cut thin slices of boiled pork tongue. The recipe for cooking a Chinese dish prescribes to grind 30 grams of lard in the same way. Throw it on a hot pan and make crispy cracklings. We mix a couple of spoons of the broth, in which the tongue was cooked, with the same amount of soy sauce. Add a stack of vodka (preferably rice). Put slices of tongue in a large pan. Pour the cooked sauce and fat with greaves. Stir and bring to a boil. We dilute a spoonful of starch with a small amount of water. Pour a thin stream into the pan. Stew for another two minutes and serve, decorating the dish with fresh herbs.
Oyster mushrooms with tongue in sour cream sauce
We continue to consider options for preparing offal as part of hot dishes. Here is the recipe for cooking pork tongue in sour cream with mushrooms. First, boil the offal until cooked, clean it. Two pork tongues will require 300 grams of oyster mushroom. These are mushrooms on which there is practically no skin, so we do not clean them, but simply wash them under running water. Finely chop the onion. Melt 50 grams of butter in a pan. We assassinate the onion until golden brown. Add coarsely chopped oyster mushrooms. Cover the pan and simmer the mushrooms for about a quarter of an hour. Add a spoonful of flour. Shuffle. Pour 150 grams of sour cream. If it is too thick, you can dilute it with milk. Stir, lower the lid. Stew so another 5-10 minutes. We cut the boiled tongue into arbitrary pieces. We spread it in a pan with mushrooms. Stew for another ten minutes. Salt the dish. Serve mashed potatoes, boiled rice or pasta.
Pie "Fairytale"
Pork tongue can be baked. But first it should be boiled and peeled. Further, the recipe for cooking in the oven of a pork tongue prescribes to lay in a thinly rolled layer of ready puff pastry. This is the core of our cake. We clean one fruit of zucchini or young zucchini, cut into strips. Fry in a pan or grill. We cut the boiled tongue with exactly the same cubes as the zucchini. Lay on the dough, alternating with zucchini. Of the four large spoons of sour cream and two small grated horseradish we make dressing. Add chopped garlic and two cloves passed through the press. Mix the dressing until smooth, distribute over the tongue and zucchini. The next layer of cake is fresh tomatoes. We cut them into circles. Sprinkle the top of the pie with a thick layer of grated cheese. Put in a hot oven. Bake at 200 degrees for about half an hour.
Fried tongue in polish
Without igniting the oven, prepare a delicious hot dish. The Polish recipe for cooking pork tongue requires first boiling the offal until cooked and peeling it. Now prepare the batter. Shake two eggs lightly with a fork with a little water and salt. Add 2 tablespoons of flour. Let's make the dough. In the end, add 1-2 soup spoons of vegetable oil to it. We cut the boiled and cooled tongue into thin slices. Now put on the pan with vegetable oil. Dice the tongue one at a time into the batter. Spread in hot fat. We fry for three minutes on each side. This dish is suitable for a side dish of boiled or fried vegetables.
Potato casserole
For this dish, you need to boil eight young tubers and two pieces of pork tongue separately. The recipe for cooking casseroles is extremely simple. Cut potatoes in circles. Spread them in a greased form with vegetable oil. Sprinkle with chopped garlic on top (2-3 cloves). Tongues without skin are also cut in circles. Spread on top of the potatoes. Salt, season with your favorite spices. Mix 200 grams of sour cream with one egg. Pour into pieces of tongue. Send to the oven, preheated 180 degrees. After a quarter of an hour, sprinkle the dish with grated cheese. We’ll send for another ten minutes.
Soup
Among the recipes for cooking pork tongue there are first courses. There are a lot of them, but they are done on the same principle. The broth in which the tongue was cooked does not pour out, but is filtered and clarified with the help of raw egg white. Vegetables, which are usually put whole when boiling the tongue, we cut beautifully. Potato can also be added to such soups.