Name: Pork, Spare Rib Of, Roasted
Ingredients: 1 spare rib of pork (about 8-9 pounds); flour for dusting; butter for basting; 12 dried sage leaves

Why it works: Pork and sage are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,527 recipes. Both carry 2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

Pork, Spare Rib Of, Roasted

Ingredients

1 spare rib of pork (about 8-9 pounds)
flour for dusting
butter for basting
12 dried sage leaves

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

Preheat your oven to 400°F (200°C).
Place the spare rib with the thick end nearest to the heat source.
Dust the meat lightly with flour and baste with melted butter.

Roast

Roast for 2 to 3 hours, depending on thickness.
About 15 minutes before it's done, baste with sage leaves.

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.

Pork + sagetop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,527 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).
Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour + sagetop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,115 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Pork + buttertop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together13,933 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).
Butter + sagetop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,312 recipes

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

Flour and butter 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

Pork spare rib: Forms the main body of the dish and provides the meat that is roasted.
Butter: Adds fat and richness, and helps the surface brown as it cooks.
Sage leaves: Add a herbal aroma when used to baste near the end of roasting.