OK, this looks pretty eww, doesn’t it?

Brawny

It’s Salceson cwaniak, which translates as “brawn”. Most Polish shops with good delikatesy (charcuterie) counters sell several types. I bought almost 100g for 69p.

Old-style English brawn usually features yummy facemeat, hock, trotters, tails; whatever bits of the pig are available. It’s pinker when the meat used is brined, brown if it’s fresh. The two Scottish versions, potted hough or potted heid, feature beef shin or sheep’s head and are, like most Scottish food except herring, cabbage and raspberries, very brown.

Salceson cwaniak is very hammy, like the French jambon persillé (without the persille) or that standby of trendy pig-fetish restaurants everywhere, ham hock terrine (£6 a go, though no doubt very good, at East London’s highly rated Brawn restaurant, http://www.brawn.co). True, some rye bread, a crunchy gherkin or two and a good smear of mustard would make it look cuter, but it’s so good on its own that it doesn’t need a support act.

And if you’re worried that adding a new type of cured meat product to your diet will, as almost-daily headlines insist http://tinyurl.com/m4sshjw, send you to an early grave, read what Rob Lyons, author of top read Panic On A Plate, has to say on the topic: http://tinyurl.com/kvqzgw7 . The people who know what’s best for us is… us.