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Roast Pig

A whole pig roasted with a butter and water glaze, seasoned with salt, pepper, and optional wine, served with gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,810 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Roast Pig

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the pig

  1. Prepare dressing as for fowl, adding chopped onion.

  2. Set the dressing aside.

  3. Dissolve baking soda in separate water.

  4. Rinse the inside of the pig again.

  5. Wipe the pig dry with a fresh towel.

  6. Salt the inside of the pig.

  7. Stuff the pig with the prepared dressing.

  8. Sew the pig up.

Roast

  1. Place the pig in a kneeling position in a dripping pan, tying the legs properly.

  2. Pour a little hot salted water into the dripping pan.

  3. Baste the pig with a mixture of butter and water as it warms.

  4. Baste the pig with gravy from the pan.

  5. When the pig begins to smoke, rub it often with a rag dipped in melted butter to keep the skin crisp.

  6. Roast for 2 to 3 hours.

Make the gravy

  1. Skim off most grease from the pan.

  2. Stir in flour.

  3. Add water to achieve the right consistency.

  4. Season with pepper.

  5. Let the gravy boil once.

  6. Strain the gravy.

  7. Add wine if desired.

  8. Serve the gravy in a gravy boat.

Serve and carve

  1. Place the pig on a large, hot platter, garnished with parsley or celery tops, a green wreath around the neck, and a sprig of celery in its mouth.

  2. Cut off the head first.

  3. Split down the back.

  4. Remove hams and shoulders.

  5. Separate the ribs.

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. Parsley + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Pig
Supplies the meat and fat that roast, render and become tender over the long cooking.
Butter
Adds fat that helps the skin brown and crisp and keeps it from drying out.
Flour
Thickens the gravy as its starch swells in the hot liquid.
Onion
Adds savory aroma to the dressing that flavors the stuffing.
Wine
Adds acidity and depth to the gravy, if used.

The step that matters

Rubbing the skin with buttered rag once it smokes. Surface fat and moisture help the skin brown and crisp evenly. Letting the skin dry out or go unfatted can leave it leathery, while too much heat without fat can scorch it.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, pepper, wine, parsley, celery):

  1. Carrotfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Turnipfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, pepper, wine, parsley, celery. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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