Skip to main content
Main

Roast Goose

Roast goose stuffed with bread crumbs, butter, sage, pepper, salt, and onion, baked until done.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 Goose

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Prepare the goose, ensuring it is no more than 8 months old.

  2. Stuff the goose with a mixture of bread crumbs, butter, sage, black pepper, coarse sea salt, and chopped onion.

  3. Do not overstuff; stitch openings firmly to keep flavor in and fat out.

Roast

  1. Place the stuffed goose in a baking pan with a little water.

  2. Baste frequently with a mixture of salt and water; vinegar may be added.

  3. Turn the goose often to ensure even browning on all sides.

  4. Bake for 2 hours or more until done.

Finish

  1. Remove from the pan, pour off the fat, and prepare the gravy.

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

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

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

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

  3. Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  4. Sage + oniontop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,628 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Butter + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Goose
Provides the meat, and its rendering fat keeps the meat moist and rich during roasting.
Bread crumbs
Soak up juices and fat, giving the stuffing a soft, moist body.
Butter
Adds richness and helps the skin brown as it melts.
Onion
Adds aroma and sweetness as it softens in the stuffing.
Sage
Adds a savoury, herbal aroma that suits rich goose.

The step that matters

Do not overstuff the goose. Stuffing expands as it heats and dense stuffing cooks slowly, so an overstuffed bird can brown outside before its centre is fully cooked. Stitching the openings firmly keeps the stuffing in place.

Swap the onion

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, butter, sage, pepper. 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.

More roast goose recipes

and Turkey 4with Apple Dressing 4Potato Stuffing for 3with Potato Stuffing 3with Sage and Onion Stuffing 3 See all 150 →

You might also like

Brown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesWhite BreadWhite Bread80 recipesBread OmeletteBread Omelette60 recipesOatmeal BreadOatmeal Bread51 recipes