Continuing with last week’s theme, if we can make a lollipop out of a disk of smoked salmon and cheese by inserting a paper stick into it, why not make one from a pig’s foot? I can’t think of a good reason why not. Especially since I was given three feet and a hock leftover from some super heirloom breed of pig that meant nothing to me—they were just feet. Since I had previously made round disks out of a pig’s head, the feet didn’t seem like they would pose a problem.

To start with, I wanted the finished meat—I hadn’t actually decided to make lollipops yet—to be a nice pink so I injected and soaked the pig parts for 3 days in a 5% salt, 2% sugar brine with the appropriate amount of sodium nitrite. (The Brine Estimator in the Tools Section of this website did all the arithmetic.)

After brining was complete, the pig parts were rinsed off and thrown into a large pot along with a large onion, a couple of carrots, some garlic gloves, a few peppercorns, and a handful of parsley. The onion and carrots were cut into large chunks without peeling. The garlic was left unpeeled, and the parsley literally was a small handful. The whole shebang was covered with filtered water and set over high heat. Once the water started to come to a simmer, the heat was turned down and a bare simmer was maintained. The initial scum that rose to the surface was skimmed off and discarded. When the meat was tender and the skin was very soft, the pot was removed from the heat.

As soon as my hands could handle the heat, the skin was carefully separated from the meat, especially on the hock where it was kept in one piece. Then the meat was separated from the bones, which were discarded along with any chunks of fat. The liquid was strained through both a coarse strainer and a fine chinois, and put back on the stove over its highest heat. The liquid was reduced down to a syrup the same as when I make a glace.

Since I had a few fresh shiitake mushrooms in the fridge, I sliced a couple and cooked them in butter, seasoned with just salt, until soft. Once these had cooled a bit, it was time for assembly.

Building the pig’s feet lollipops is similar to building the smoked salmon ones of last week’s posting. A 30-cm (12-in) long piece of plastic wrap was laid directly on my countertop with no significant air bubbles. On this I laid a rectangular piece of pig skin from the hock. Since the skin was somewhat trapezoidal, it had to be trimmed and the few holes patched. The meat pieces that had been previously harvested was, where large, torn into strips. All the warm meat and mushroom slices were mixed with enough of the warm, reduced pork stock to moistened them. The meat-mushroom combination was arranged along the near edge of the pork skin and the whole assembly formed into a cylinder with the aid of the plastic wrap. The loose ends of the plastic wrap were twisted while the whole “sausage” was pulled into a very tight cylinder. A second layer of plastic wrap was tightened even more around the package. The whole assembly was then placed in the refrigerator overnight.

The next day, the cylinder was unwrapped and a fresh layer of plastic wrap was pulled tight around it. The loose ends were tied with strips of plastic wrap mushed into a string shape. The completed cylinder was placed in the freezer until it showed up “on the menu.”

A couple of hours before serving, the pig’s foot cylinder was moved to the refrigerator. Just before service, a series of dots were marked right on the plastic wrap with a Sharpie. The dots were spaced 8 mm (1⁄3 in) apart, one dot for each lollipop. Next, using a fat, sharp-pointed skewer, a hole was poked into each dot to a depth of about two-thirds of the cylinder diameter. Then a paper lollipop stick was inserted into each hole. After that, using a very sharp knife and a slicing motion, the cylinder was cut halfway between each stick and through the plastic wrap to separate the individual lollipops. The lollipops were placed flat on a plate and the plate set back into my refrigerator. The cut end of the remaining cylinder was covered with plastic wrap and returned to its place in the freezer.

To serve the pig’s feet lollipops, the plastic wrap was carefully removed from each one, and its stick inserted into a shot glass filled with rock salt. A small dollop of coarse-grain mustard was balanced on top of the meat, and a sliver of green onion placed on top of the mustard.