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Roast Goose

Roast goose stuffed with bread crumbs, butter, onions, sage, pepper, and salt, baked and served with gravy, currant jelly, apple sauce, and onion sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 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 Goose

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the goose

  1. Kill the goose at least 24 hours before cooking.

  2. Cut the neck close to the back and flatten the breastbone with a rolling pin.

  3. Tie the wings and legs securely.

  4. Stuff the goose with a mixture of bread crumbs, butter, chopped onions, sage, black pepper, and salt.

  5. Do not overstuff; stitch openings firmly to keep flavor in and fat out.

  6. If the goose is not fat, lard it with salt pork or tie a slice on the breast.

Roast and baste

  1. Place the goose in a baking pan with a little water.

  2. Baste frequently with salt and water, turning often for even browning.

  3. When nearly done, baste with butter and a little flour.

  4. Bake for 2 hours, or longer if the goose is older.

  5. Once done, remove from the pan and pour off the fat.

Make the gravy and serve

  1. Add chopped giblets and the water they were boiled in to the brown gravy left in the pan.

  2. Thicken the gravy with flour and butter rubbed together, bring to a boil, and serve with currant jelly.

  3. Serve with apple sauce and onion 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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  3. Onion + porktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,214 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Sage + porktop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,527 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Goose
Provides the main meat and its fat, which renders out during roasting.
Bread crumbs
Absorb the drippings and juices inside the bird, giving the stuffing a moist, soft texture.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that helps the skin brown and the basting flavor develop.
Onions
Add savory sweetness and aroma to the stuffing as they soften and cook.
Flour
Thickens the gravy and helps the basting butter brown on the surface.

The step that matters

Pouring off the fat after roasting. Goose has a large amount of fat that renders during roasting. Removing it from the pan before making gravy keeps the gravy from becoming greasy and thin, and it helps the thickening with flour and butter work properly.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Lemonfits better
  2. Avocadofits better
  3. Limefits better
  4. Currantthe original

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