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To Roast a Sucking Pig

A whole pig roasted after cleaning, gutting, stuffing with sage, breadcrumbs, pepper, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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 ↓

To Roast a Sucking Pig

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the pig

  1. Stick the pig above the breastbone into the heart to ensure it dies quickly.

  2. Soak the pig in cold water for a few minutes.

  3. Scald it in hot water for one minute.

  4. Remove all the hairs quickly.

  5. If they don't come off clean, scald again.

  6. Wash the pig well in warm water.

  7. Rinse in cold water.

Clean and stuff

  1. Remove the feet at the first joint.

  2. Cut open the belly to take out the entrails.

  3. Combine the heart, liver, lights, and pettitoes.

  4. Wash the pig in cold water and dry it with a cloth.

  5. Hang the pig up until the next day.

  6. Finely chop sage and mix it with bread crumbs, pepper, and salt.

  7. Stuff this mixture into the belly and sew it up.

Roast

  1. Spit the pig and roast it over a brisk fire, using a pig-iron to help with cooking.

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. Sage + breadtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,778 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Bread + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,964 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Sage + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,312 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

What each ingredient does

Sucking pig
The meat itself; slow roasting cooks it through and crisps the skin.
Bread crumbs
Absorb juices and fat, giving the stuffing body and moisture.
Sage
Adds a savory, herbal aroma that flavours the stuffing.

The step that matters

Scalding the pig. Hot water loosens the hair so it pulls out cleanly. Scalding too long or too hot can partly cook the skin and make it tear, so the one-minute scald and quick hair removal matter.

Swap the sage

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

  1. Parsleyfits about as well
  2. Sagethe original
  3. Thymefits about as well
  4. Nutmegfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, pepper, 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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