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Goose or Duck Stuffing

A savory stuffing made with onion, sage, bread crumbs, butter, egg, pepper, salt, and optional apple for goose or duck.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Goose or Duck Stuffing

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 ↓

Goose or Duck Stuffing

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Finely chop the onion and sage leaves.

  2. In a bowl, combine the chopped onion, sage, bread crumbs, butter, egg, pepper, and salt.

  3. If desired, add minced apple.

  4. Mix the ingredients well to form the stuffing.

Stuff the bird

  1. Stuff the goose or duck, leaving some room for the stuffing to swell.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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 + walnuttop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together179 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Sage + appletop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together755 recipes

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

  5. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 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

Stale bread crumbs
Provide the bulk of the stuffing and absorb moisture from the butter and egg.
Egg
Binds the crumbs and onion together so the stuffing holds its shape.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, giving the stuffing a softer, more tender texture.
Onion
Adds savoury sweetness and moisture as it mixes through the stuffing.
Sage leaves
Contributes the herbal aroma that characterises this stuffing.

The step that matters

Leave room for the stuffing to swell. Bread crumbs and egg expand as they heat, so packing the bird tightly can compress the stuffing and trap steam unevenly. Loose filling lets heat reach the centre and keeps the texture even.

Swap the apple

The recipe marks apple as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, sage, bread, walnut, butter, egg, pepper):

  1. Lemonfits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Avocadofits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, sage, bread, walnut, butter, egg, 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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