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Roast Goose

A whole goose stuffed with bread crumbs, butter, sage, pepper, salt, onion, baked until cooked, served with a thickened gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 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

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the goose

  1. Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Stuff the goose with a mixture of bread crumbs, butter, sage, black pepper, salt, and chopped onion. Do not overstuff.

  3. Stitch the openings firmly to keep the flavor in and fat out.

Roast

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

  2. Baste frequently with saltwater (add vinegar if desired).

  3. Turn the goose often to ensure even browning.

  4. Bake for two hours or more until done.

Make the gravy and serve

  1. Remove the goose from the pan and pour off the fat.

  2. To the remaining brown gravy, add the chopped giblets (previously stewed until tender) and the water they were boiled in.

  3. Thicken the gravy with a mixture of flour and butter.

  4. Bring to a boil. Serve.

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

Goose
Is the main cooked meat, providing the body of the dish and its rich drippings.
Bread crumbs
Absorb the goose's fat and juices inside the cavity, keeping the stuffing moist and flavorful.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that enhances flavor and helps the skin brown.
Flour
Thickens the pan gravy into a smooth, body-rich sauce when cooked with butter.
Onion
Adds aromatic sweetness and savory depth to the stuffing as it softens during roasting.

The step that matters

Turning and basting the goose during roasting. Turning and basting redistribute fat and moisture so the skin browns evenly and the meat does not dry out over the long roast. Skipping these leaves pale, uneven skin and drier meat.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Sweet potatofits better
  4. Onionthe original

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