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Pork, Belly of

A pork belly stuffed with breadcrumbs, sage, salt, pepper, and shallots, then baked or roasted.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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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 ↓

Pork, Belly of

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Lay the belly of pork skin-side down on a flat surface.

  2. Sprinkle the inside with bread crumbs, sage, salt, pepper, and minced shallots.

  3. Roll the meat tightly and bind it with tape.

Cook and serve

  1. Bake or roast the meat for 20 minutes per pound.

  2. Serve hot with brown gravy or allow to cool and press.

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. Sage + shallottop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together181 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Pepper + shallottop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,898 recipes

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

  4. Pork + sagetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,527 recipes

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

  5. Bread + shallottop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,245 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

Pork belly
Its fat renders during cooking, keeping the meat moist and tender.
Bread crumbs
They absorb meat juices and help hold the stuffing together inside the roll.
Sage
Adds a warm, aromatic herb flavour that suits the rich pork.
Shallots
Add a mild onion flavour and gentle sweetness once cooked.

The step that matters

Roll the meat tightly and bind it. A tight roll keeps the stuffing packed inside while the meat cooks and shrinks. A loose roll lets the filling escape and the slices fall apart.

Swap the shallot

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Tomatofits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Shallotthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, bread, 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.

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