Name: Mr. Cookes Forcemeat for Ducks or Geese
Ingredients: 3 large onions; 1 ½ cups bread crumbs; 3 ounces butter; 2 tablespoons minced sage; ¼ teaspoon pepper; 1 teaspoon coarse sea salt

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 ↓

Mr. Cookes Forcemeat for Ducks or Geese

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Boil the onions for 10 to 15 minutes, then press out the water and chop them finely.
Mix the chopped onions with bread crumbs, minced sage, butter, pepper, and salt.

Finish and stuff

Optionally, add boiled and finely shredded liver and bind the mixture with 1 or 2 egg yolks.
Stuff the mixture into the body of the duck or goose.

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.

Sage + peppertop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,388 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together68,474 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Onion + sagetop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,628 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Onion + buttertop 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

Onions: Provide moisture and sweetness that soften into the stuffing as it cooks.
Bread crumbs: Absorb butter and onion juices to give the forcemeat body and a soft texture.
Butter: Adds richness and fat, carrying flavour and keeping the stuffing moist.
Egg yolks (in the method): Bind the mixture together so it holds its shape when stuffed and cooked.

The step that matters

Press out the water from the boiled onions. Onions hold a lot of water. If it is not pressed out, the crumbs turn soggy and the forcemeat becomes wet and loose instead of holding together.

Swap the onion

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

Capsicumfits better
Shallotfits better
Carrotfits better
Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, butter, sage, pepper. 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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Mr. Cookes Forcemeat for Ducks or Geese