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Roast Pig

A whole pig roasted with a savory filling of liver, haslets, bread crumbs, butter, eggs, herbs, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 18 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and sage 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 ↓

Roast Pig

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the pig

  1. After killing the pig, place it in cold water to tenderize.

  2. Quickly immerse it in hot boiling water, then remove and shake off the hair.

  3. Scrape and wash the pig until very clean, then remove the entrails.

  4. Hang the pig for at least an hour to cool.

  5. In summer, wrap it in a towel and place it on ice.

Make the dressing and stuff the pig

  1. Stew the liver and haslets, chop finely, and mix with bread crumbs, butter, chopped hard-boiled eggs, parsley, thyme, pepper, salt, and sage.

  2. Rub the inside of the pig with pepper and salt, then fill it with the dressing and sew it up securely.

  3. Bend the forelegs under the body and the hindlegs forward, then skewer them in place.

Roast and serve

  1. Place the pig in a baking pan and pour hot water over it.

  2. Rub the pig with butter, sprinkle with salt and pepper, and add a bouquet of herbs and a piece of butter in the pan.

  3. Cover the pig with another pan and cook slowly until done.

  4. Remove the pan, rub with butter, and baste often.

  5. When browned, sift powdered cracker over the pig.

  6. Serve the pig kneeling in a large dish, garnished with curled parsley and an orange in its mouth.

  7. Serve hot with gravy or cold with horseradish.

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. Thyme + sagetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,485 recipes

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

  2. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Parsley + sagetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,445 recipes

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

  4. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + sagetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Pig
Forms the whole roast; its fat and skin brown and crisp as it cooks.
Bread crumbs
Absorb the juices and butter in the dressing, giving it a moist, binding texture.
Hard-boiled eggs
Bind the dressing and add a soft, rich texture within the stuffing.
Butter
Adds fat that enriches the dressing and helps the skin brown when rubbed on.

The step that matters

Cover and cook slowly until done. Slow covered cooking keeps the large body moist and cooks the thick meat through, while the later uncovered basting drives browning. Rushing the heat risks dry outer meat with an undercooked centre.

Swap the orange

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

  1. Lemonfits better
  2. Limefits better
  3. Red currantfits about as well
  4. Orangethe original

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