Name: Roast Pig
Ingredients: 1 cup bread crumbs; 1 onion, chopped; 2 teaspoons powdered sage; 3 tablespoons melted butter; ¼ teaspoon pepper; ½ teaspoon salt; 2 eggs, well beaten; ½ cup warm water or milk

Why it works: Sage and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,388 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Roast Pig

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Preheat your oven to 400°F (200°C).
In a bowl, mix the bread crumbs, onion, sage, melted butter, pepper, and salt.
Moisten the mixture with warm water or milk, then beat in the eggs.
Stuff the pig with the mixture, sew it up, and bind the fore feet backward and hind feet forward.
Skewer the pig into the proper position, dry it well, and dredge with flour.
Place it in a roasting pan with a little hot, slightly salted water.
Baste with butter and water three times during roasting.
When it begins to steam, rub it with a cloth dipped in melted butter every five minutes.
Roast for about 1 hour and 45 minutes to 2 hours, or longer if needed.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

Sage + peppertop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,388 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together11,466 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together68,474 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, sage, butter, pepper, egg, milk):

Capsicumfits better
Potatofits better
Asparagusfits better
Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, sage, butter, pepper, egg, milk. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.