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Baked Pig

Whole pig roasted in butter, flour, and veal gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Baked Pig

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the pig

  1. Clean and wash the pig thoroughly.

  2. Rub the pig all over with butter and sprinkle with flour.

  3. Place the pig in a well-buttered baking dish.

Bake and dry

  1. Bake the pig in a 350°F (175°C) oven for about two hours.

  2. Remove the pig from the oven.

  3. Rub the pig with a greased cloth.

  4. Return the pig to the oven with the door open to dry.

Cut and plate

  1. Chop off the head of the pig.

  2. Split the pig in halves.

  3. Cut the pig in halves lengthwise.

  4. Arrange the pig on a dish, back to back, with the head halves at either end.

Make the gravy and serve

  1. Skim off the fat from the baking dish.

  2. Add veal gravy to the dish.

  3. Add a small lump of butter rolled in flour to thicken the gravy.

  4. Boil the gravy once.

  5. Pour the gravy through a sieve over the pig.

  6. Serve.

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. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Veal + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,049 recipes

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

  4. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

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

  5. Butter + vealtop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,381 recipes

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

Butter and flour 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

Pig
The main body that is cooked whole, then cut and served as the dish.
Butter
Rubbed on the surface to add richness and help the skin brown during baking.
Flour
Sprinkled on the surface, where it helps form a browned crust during baking.
Veal gravy
Supplies the savoury liquid that is served over the pig.
Butter rolled in flour
The flour thickens the gravy and the butter adds richness to it.

The step that matters

Return the pig to the oven with the door open to dry. Drying the surface after the greased cloth helps it crisp and brown rather than steam. Leaving the door open lets moisture escape, so the skin stays dry and does not turn soggy.

“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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