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A Delicate Roast Pig

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Sage and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 507 recipes. Both carry 2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

A Delicate Roast Pig

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Soak the pig in cold water overnight.

  2. Change the water in the morning and let it soak until ready to roast.

  3. Wipe the pig dry and rub the inside with a mixture of sage, cayenne, and coarse sea salt.

  4. Stuff the pig with a dressing made of bread crumbs, chopped salt pork, black pepper, coarse sea salt, sage, sweet marjoram, and 1 egg.

  5. Place the pig on a rack in a dripping pan with water and tied sprigs of sage and marjoram.

  6. Keep the pig well-floured until half done.

  7. Remove the pig, wipe off the flour, and return it to the oven.

  8. Baste the pig with butter several times until fully roasted, about three hours.

  9. Serve on a large platter with a rose or small unhusked ear of green corn in its mouth.

  10. Thicken the gravy from the dripping pan with flour and season with pepper and salt, then serve in a boat.

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.

  1. Sage + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together507 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  2. Pepper + marjoramtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,609 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Sage + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  5. Sage + porktop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,527 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).

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

Swap the marjoram

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

  1. Marjoramthe original
  2. Thymefits about as well
  3. Parsleyfits about as well
  4. Nutmegfits less well

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

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