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Stuffing for Roast Pig

A savory bread crumb mixture seasoned with salt, pepper, sage, butter, and onion, used to stuff a pig before roasting.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and sage 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 ↓

Stuffing for Roast Pig

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the stuffing

  1. Mix the bread crumbs with the butter, rubbing it in well.

  2. Add the salt, pepper, sage, and chopped onion, and mix thoroughly.

  3. Stuff the mixture into the body of the pig.

Truss the pig

  1. Position the fore-feet forward and the hind-feet backward, then skewer the feet in place.

  2. Open the mouth and insert a small block of wood between the teeth.

  3. Butter two sheets of paper and pin them around the ears.

Roast

  1. Sprinkle the pig with salt, rub it with soft butter, and dredge it with flour.

  2. Place the pig in a roasting pan.

  3. Cook for at least 3.5 hours, basting every 15-20 minutes with butter or salad oil.

  4. Lightly sprinkle with salt and flour after each basting.

  5. Avoid using water to keep the surface crisp.

  6. Remove the paper from the ears during the last half hour of cooking.

Finish and serve

  1. Remove the block from the mouth.

  2. Replace it with a small ear of corn or a small lemon.

  3. Serve with apple sauce.

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

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

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

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

  3. Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Sage + oniontop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,628 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Butter + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Bread crumbs
Provides bulk that soaks up butter and juices to form the stuffing.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, and helps the skin brown during basting.
Sage
Adds a herbal, savoury aroma that suits pork.
Onion
Softens during mixing and adds savoury flavour to the stuffing.
Flour (in the method)
Dusted on the skin to help it brown and form a crisp surface.

The step that matters

Avoid using water to keep the surface crisp. Water turns to steam and softens the skin, while fat from basting promotes browning and a crisp surface. Keeping water away lets the skin dry and crisp as it roasts.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Carrotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

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