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Leg of Fresh Pork Roasted

A roasted leg of pork stuffed with bread, butter, salt, pepper, and onion, served with apple sauce and fried potatoes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and potato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Leg of Fresh Pork Roasted

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the pork

  1. Score the leg of pork in crossed lines.

  2. Loosen the bone with a knife and remove it.

  3. Fill the cavity with a rich stuffing made from stale bread, seasoned with butter, coarse sea salt, black pepper, and onion.

  4. Sew the opening to prevent the stuffing from coming out.

Roast and serve

  1. Place the pork on a spit.

  2. Baste the pork with fresh butter.

  3. Cook for 3 to 4 hours, depending on the size.

  4. Serve with hot apple sauce and fried fresh potatoes cut into quarters.

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. Onion + potatotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  2. Pork + potatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

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

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

  4. Pepper + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  5. Pork + oniontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,214 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

What each ingredient does

Pork leg
Provides the main meat, which becomes tender and juicy during long, slow cooking.
Stale bread
Forms the body of the stuffing and soaks up butter and juices as it cooks.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture, and helps the surface brown when basted.
Onion
Adds savory aroma and depth of flavour to the stuffing.

The step that matters

Cook for 3 to 4 hours, depending on the size. A stuffed joint needs enough time for the thickest part and the centre of the stuffing to reach a safe internal temperature. Judging by size rather than checking the internal temperature risks undercooked meat or dry outer layers.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pork, bread, butter, pepper, onion, sauce, potato):

  1. Avocadofits better
  2. Mangofits better
  3. Coconutfits about as well
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, bread, butter, pepper, onion, sauce, potato. 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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