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Roast Little Pig

A roasted small pig stuffed with onion, breadcrumbs, sage, butter, pepper, salt, and egg, served with apple or tomato sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 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 ↓

Roast Little Pig

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 300°F in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Prepare the pig by cleaning and stuffing it with the onion, bread crumbs, sage, butter, pepper, salt, and egg mixture, or alternatively use veal force-meat stuffing or hot mashed potatoes.

  2. Sew the pig closed with strong thread, trussing the fore legs forward and hind legs backward.

  3. Rub the pig with butter, flour, pepper, and salt.

Roast and serve

  1. Roast the pig over a very slow fire or in a cool oven (300°F/150°C) at first, basting the pig often while roasting.

  2. After about three hours, place a cob or potato in the mouth to keep it open.

  3. Serve with apple sauce or tomato 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. Sage + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

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

  2. Onion + potatotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Pepper + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  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

Little pig
Is the main meat, cooked whole so its skin and flesh roast together slowly.
Bread crumbs
Absorb butter and juices in the stuffing, keeping it moist and giving it body.
Egg
Binds the stuffing mixture so it holds together when cooked.
Butter
Adds fat that carries flavour and helps the skin brown and stay moist.
Onions
Add sweetness and aroma as they soften within the stuffing.

The step that matters

Roasting slowly and basting. Low, gentle heat cooks the whole pig through without drying or burning the outside, and frequent basting with fat keeps the skin moist while it browns.

Swap the potato

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

  1. Capsicumfits about as well
  2. Chivefits about as well
  3. Leekfits about as well
  4. Potatothe original

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