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Stuffed Leg of Pork

A pork leg stuffed with onions, apple, bread crumbs, sage, butter, and egg yolk, then baked and served with apple sauce and brown gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 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 ↓

Stuffed Leg of Pork

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the pork

  1. Partly boil the leg of pork for about 1 hour, then remove the skin.

  2. If desired, boil the minced onions before using.

Stuff the pork

  1. In a bowl, combine the minced onions, chopped apple, grated bread crumbs, chopped sage, butter, salt, pepper, and egg yolk. Mix well.

  2. Make a long slit in the knuckle of the pork and stuff it with the mixture. Secure the opening.

Bake and serve

  1. Place the pork in a baking dish and baste continually while baking.

  2. Mix 2 tablespoons of bread crumbs with 1 tablespoon of powdered sage, salt, and pepper to create a savory powder.

  3. Half an hour before the pork is done, sprinkle the savory powder over it and do not baste afterward.

  4. Bake or roast the pork for 1.5 hours.

  5. Serve with apple sauce and brown gravy.

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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Apple + sagetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together755 recipes

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

  4. Pork + oniontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,214 recipes

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

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Leg of pork
Forms the main meat that becomes tender and juicy during long cooking.
Egg yolk
Binds the stuffing so it holds together when sliced.
Bread crumbs
Absorb juices in the stuffing and add body to the filling.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and helps the stuffing taste savory and moist.
Onions
Add savory flavor and moisture to the stuffing.
Apple
Adds gentle sweetness and moisture that balances the savory sage filling.

The step that matters

Basting only until the savory powder goes on. Basting keeps the surface moist, but once the savory powder is applied, further basting would wet it and soften the crumb coating meant to brown and crisp.

Swap the apple

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

  1. Lemonfits better
  2. Avocadofits about as well
  3. Applethe original
  4. Limefits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, onion, bread, sage, butter, pepper, egg. 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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