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Boiled Belly of Pork

A pork belly rolled, seasoned, and baked or roasted until cooked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 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 ↓

Boiled Belly of Pork

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut off the belly part of the pork.

  2. Dust it copiously with powdered sweet herbs, sage, shallots, salt, and pepper.

  3. Roll it up tightly and tie it with broad tape.

Cook and serve

  1. Bake or roast until done.

  2. When cold, untie it and 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. Sage + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

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

  2. Sage + shallottop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together181 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Shallot + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,898 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Pork + sagetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,527 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  5. Pork + shallottop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,316 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Pork belly
Its fat renders during cooking, keeping the meat moist and adding richness.
Sage
Contributes a savory, aromatic flavor that complements the fatty pork.
Shallots
Add a mild, sweet onion-like aroma that deepens as they cook.
Powdered sweet herbs
Add aromatic flavor to the surface of the meat as it cooks.

The step that matters

Bake or roast until done. Because the meat is rolled and tied, its center is hidden and color alone is unreliable. Cooking until the centre is fully done ensures the pork is safe and evenly cooked, and the fat has rendered properly.

Swap the shallot

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Carrotfits better
  4. Shallotthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, 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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