Name: To Barbacue a Leg of Pork
Ingredients: 1 leg of pork; 2 bottles of red wine; 2 anchovies; 3 hard-boiled egg yolks, finely pounded; ½ cup butter; ½ lemon, juiced; 1 bunch of fresh herbs; 1 teaspoon lemon pickle; 1 tablespoon ketchup

Why it works: Pork and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 13,933 recipes. Both carry 2-furfurylthiol, which smells coffee, roasted. The science ↓

To Barbacue a Leg of Pork

Ingredients

Directions

Roast the pork

Roast the leg of pork before a good fire, basting it with red wine continuously.
Cut the skin of the pork into 1-inch wide strips, raise every other strip, and roll it back.

Make the sauce

Once cooked, take the remaining liquid from the pan and add anchovies, egg yolks, butter, lemon juice, fresh herbs, lemon pickle, and ketchup.
Boil the sauce for a few minutes.
Strain the sauce and pour it over the pork while hot.

Serve

Garnish with oyster patties and fresh parsley before serving.

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 + buttertop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together13,933 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).
Red wine + buttertop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,599 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).
Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,227 recipes

Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together118,967 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Pork + red winetop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together680 recipes

Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

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

What each ingredient does

Leg of pork: Provides the main cut of meat that is roasted and carved into strips.
Red wine: Basting liquid that adds moisture and flavour to the pork as it roasts.
Hard-boiled egg yolks: Finely pounded yolks thicken the sauce and give it a rich, smooth body.
Butter: Adds fat for richness and a smooth, glossy texture to the sauce.
Anchovies: Contribute savoury depth to the sauce.

The step that matters

Strain the sauce and pour it over the pork while hot. The sauce is thickened by egg yolks and butter, which can scramble or separate if overheated. Keeping it hot but not boiling, and pouring it while still warm, helps it stay smooth and coat the meat.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pork, red wine, egg, butter, ketchup):

Applefits better
Lemonthe original
Red currantfits about as well
Grapefits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, red wine, egg, butter, ketchup. 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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Pork Cake107 recipes

Roast Pork82 recipes

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To Barbacue a Leg of Pork