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Onion Stuffing

A savory dish of boiled onions mixed with breadcrumbs, sage, and seasonings, baked with rendered fat until crisp.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 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 ↓

Onion Stuffing

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the onions

  1. Peel the onions and cut them into quarters.

  2. Boil the onions in salted water until nearly soft, then strain and chop finely.

Make the stuffing

  1. Mix the chopped onions with breadcrumbs, sage, and seasonings.

Render the fat

  1. Cut the fat into small pieces and place them in a dripping tin.

  2. Set the dripping tin in a larger tin with a little water.

  3. Cook in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until the pieces are crisp, then strain.

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. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  3. Onion + sagetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,628 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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 keep the stuffing soft and flavourful.
Breadcrumbs
Absorb moisture from the onions and help bind the stuffing together.
Sage
Adds a warm, aromatic herb flavour to the stuffing.
Fat
Browns and crisps as it renders, leaving flavourful fat behind for richness.

The step that matters

Cook the fat until the pieces are crisp. Rendering needs steady, moderate heat so the fat melts out and the pieces crisp without scorching. Too little time leaves fat unrendered, while too much heat burns the solids and makes the drippings bitter.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Spinachfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against 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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