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On Roasting Meat

Instructions for roasting meat with drippings, butter, salt, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

On Roasting Meat

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Prepare a clear, good fire and set the roasting tin back from the heat.

  2. Turn the spit often until the meat is hot.

  3. Baste the meat with its drippings or clarified fat.

  4. For veal and poultry, use a little butter for the last basting.

  5. For beef and mutton, use the drippings from the roasting tin.

  6. Dredge a little coarse sea salt and flour on the meat.

  7. Baste well about twenty minutes before serving for a rich brown appearance.

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. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Meat + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,594 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Meat + vealtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,890 recipes

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

  4. Butter + vealtop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,381 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  5. Veal + flourtop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,886 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Meat of your choice
Is the main cooking subject; its fat and juices carry the flavour and browning of the roast.
Drippings from the meat or clarified fat
Basting fat that moistens the surface and helps it brown evenly.
Butter (for veal and poultry)
Adds richness and helps the surface of lighter meats brown during the final basting.
Flour
Dusted on the meat, it helps form a browned crust and thickens the drippings.

The step that matters

Baste well about twenty minutes before serving. Basting late builds a glossy, brown surface. Fat coats the meat and browning reactions proceed at its surface, so the appearance depends on timing.

“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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