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Piggie, or Sucking-pig

A whole pig stuffed with bread crumbs, suet, sage, pepper, salt, lemon peel, and optionally egg, then roasted.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Sage and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 887 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Piggie, or Sucking-pig

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Make a stuffing by mixing bread crumbs, suet, sage, pepper, salt, and lemon peel.

  2. If using, moisten the stuffing with an egg and some water.

  3. Stuff the pig and sew it up with strong thread.

  4. Truss the pig with its fore-legs skewered back and hind-legs forward.

Roast

  1. Place the pig on a trivet in a roasting pan with 1 pint of water.

  2. Rub the pig all over with butter or sheep-tail fat.

  3. For a crisp skin, rub the pig with egg white before roasting.

  4. Roast in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C) for 2 hours.

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 + lemontop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together887 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  3. Sage + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Bread crumbs
Absorb the suet and juices, forming a moist, bulky stuffing inside the pig.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the stuffing moist and rich as it roasts.
Butter or sheep-tail fat
Fat rubbed on the skin that promotes browning and a golden, crisp surface.
Egg
Binds the stuffing together and, as a wash, helps the skin crisp and brown.

The step that matters

Rubbing the skin with egg white for a crisp finish. Egg white dries to a thin protein layer that sets and browns in the oven, helping the skin turn crisp. Skipping it or applying it unevenly can leave the skin soft and pale in patches.

Swap the sage

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, pepper, lemon, egg, 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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