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Roast Pig

A whole pig roasted with a breadcrumb and herb dressing, basted with butter and water, served with a wine and lemon gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 17 ingredients
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Why it works: Sage and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 642 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Roast Pig

Oven, in the book's wordsA steady oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a steady oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the pig

  1. Rinse the pig with soda and water, then with clean water, and dry inside and out.

  2. Prepare the dressing by mixing bread crumbs, chopped onion, sage, melted butter, salt, pepper, nutmeg, egg yolks, and moisten with soup stock.

  3. Stuff the pig with the dressing, sew it up, and place it in a kneeling position in a roasting pan, securing the legs.

  4. Dredge the pig with flour.

  5. Pour a little hot salted water into the pan.

Roast

  1. Baste with butter and water three times as the pig warms.

  2. Baste with gravy from the pan.

  3. When the skin begins to smoke, rub it every ten minutes with a rag dipped in melted butter to prevent cracking.

  4. Roast in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) for two hours.

Make the gravy

  1. Skim and strain the gravy.

  2. Thicken with browned flour.

  3. Boil.

  4. Add wine and lemon juice.

Serve

  1. Transfer the pig to a large hot dish.

  2. Garnish with parsley and celery-tops.

  3. Place a wreath of green around its neck with a sprig of celery in its mouth.

  4. Serve in a boat.

  5. Cut off the head first.

  6. Split down the back.

  7. Remove hams and shoulders.

  8. Separate the ribs.

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 + nutmegtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together642 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

  4. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  5. Nutmeg + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Pig
Is the main mass being roasted, so its size sets the cooking time and its skin is the crisp element.
Bread crumbs
Absorb the butter and stock to form a moist, bulky stuffing that keeps the inside tender.
Egg yolks
Bind the dressing so it holds together when stuffed and sliced.
Melted butter
Adds fat that helps the skin brown and keeps it from cracking as it roasts.
Soup stock
Moistens the dressing and adds savory flavour to the stuffing and gravy.
Wine
Adds acidity and depth to the gravy that is served with the pig.

The step that matters

Rubbing the skin with butter when it begins to smoke. Once the skin starts to smoke it is drying and at risk of cracking or burning. Regular buttering adds fat that promotes even browning and keeps the crackling intact.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Spinachfits better
  3. Sweet potatofits better
  4. Onionthe original

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