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To Roast Goose

A whole goose roasted with sage, thyme, parsley, and a small amount of butter, served with a reduced‑fat gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Sage and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,485 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

To Roast Goose

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Prepare the goose as you would for ducks.

  2. Chop the giblets as you would for turkey and duck.

Stuff and season

  1. Add sage, thyme, and parsley to the stuffing.

  2. Use only a little butter since geese are generally fatty.

Roast and serve

  1. Roast the goose for three hours.

  2. Pour off nearly all the fat that drips from the goose to avoid oily 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 + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,485 recipes

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

  2. Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Sage + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,445 recipes

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

  4. Parsley + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

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

  5. Sage + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,312 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

What each ingredient does

Goose
Provides the main meat and its own fat, which renders during roasting.
Sage
Adds a savoury, aromatic herb flavour to the stuffing.
Thyme
Adds a savoury, aromatic herb flavour to the stuffing.
Parsley
Adds a fresh, mild herbal flavour to the stuffing.
Butter
Adds richness and flavour, used sparingly because the goose is already fatty.

The step that matters

Pour off the fat. Goose releases a large amount of fat as it roasts. Removing most of it during cooking keeps the gravy from becoming greasy and oily, and prevents the fat from pooling around the bird.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Rosemaryfits better
  3. Parsleythe original
  4. Tarragonfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against sage, thyme, butter. 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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