A favourite of the Anglo Saxons.
Pork was know as ‘swin’ or modern ‘swine’. With no secondary uses a pig would have been used solely for its meat.
A Saxon swineherd who looked after his lords pigs was entitled to one pig and its entrails, presumably for making sausage casings.
Ingredients:
3 pig tails (cut into 1-1.5’’ chunks)
1.5L chicken stock
1 onion (finely chopped)
3 white or purple carrots (quartered and diced)
3 handfuls of split peas
3 celery (finely chopped)
Handful of wild garlic (roughly chopped)
2 bay leaves
Butter
Method:
Stick the pig tails in a pan or cauldron. Add the stock.
Bring to a boil & simmer for 40 minutes. Add the rest of the ingredients and cook for a further 20 minutes.
Remove from the heat and remove the tails from the soup.
Heat some butter in a pan and fry the tails for 10-20 minutes, until crispy. Return the tails to the soup and serve.
Taken from my book ‘Eat like a Viking!’ Available now on Amazon