Pig-head rice

What it is

Pig-head rice (豬頭飯) is long-grain indica rice (在來米) cooked in stock made by boiling a pig's head. No head meat sits on top; the name comes from the stock. The grains stay separate and smell of lard. It is sold by the small bowl, and diners build a meal around it from side dishes.

Where it came from

The dish belongs to Yanshui (鹽水), an old river port in northern Tainan once called Yuejin (月津), and to neighbouring Xinying (新營). Beyond those two districts it is rarely seen.

The local story, told so often it has become the standard version, places it under Japanese rule. Food was short and pigs were killed only for festivals, so farming households wasted nothing and cooked their rice in the stock left from boiling the head. The writer Shu Kuo-chih (舒國治) gave a similar account in 2012: poor households cooked rice in the broth from blanching a pig's head rather than pour it away.

A second story explains the name. Farmers are said to have come to eat straight from the fields with hoes on their shoulders, so people called it hoe rice (鋤頭飯), and over time the name became pig-head rice.

How it is made

A whole pig's head is simmered for at least two hours; some cooks add bones and pork belly. The fat is skimmed and the stock goes into a pot of indica rice. Each cook sets the amounts of water, salt and shallot, and some add liquid from boiling dried shrimp. Rice aged for a year is preferred because it holds less water and does not turn mushy. Food writers have likened the result to paella and risotto.

How to eat it

Order a bowl or two of rice, then pick dishes from a counter, much like the old Tainan rice-table eateries (飯桌仔). The classic partners are sausage and blanched pork from the cheek, ear and bone (骨仔肉), dipped in garlic soy paste. Regulars simply ask for "one set" (一組). The rice can also be mixed with lard or sausage fat.