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To Roast a Sucking-pig

A roast suckling pig seasoned with bread crumbs, sage, pepper, salt, butter, and port wine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 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 ↓

To Roast a Sucking-pig

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare and stuff

  1. Rub the pig dry with a cloth.

  2. Stuff the pig with bread crumbs, sage, pepper, salt, and butter mixed with port wine.

Roast

  1. Place the pig before a clear, brisk fire.

  2. While roasting, frequently rub the pig with a piece of butter tied in a cloth.

  3. Roast for about 1.5 hours until it is a fine brown.

Carve and serve

  1. Cut off the head and remove the brains.

  2. Cut the pig down the back and belly.

  3. Lay it in a dish and serve with 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. Sage + walnuttop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together179 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Pepper + walnuttop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,039 recipes

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

  5. Butter + port winetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,499 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

What each ingredient does

Sucking pig
Forms the main body of the dish, cooked whole until the skin browns and the meat becomes tender.
Butter
Adds moisture and richness, and its milk solids help the skin brown as it roasts.
Bread crumbs
Absorb the juices and butter inside the cavity, keeping the stuffing moist and flavourful.
Port wine
Adds sweetness and aroma to the butter stuffing as it cooks.

The step that matters

Roasting with brisk, steady heat. A clear, brisk fire lets the skin crisp and brown before the meat dries out. Frequent basting with butter keeps the surface moist and promotes even browning.

Swap the walnut

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

  1. Walnutthe original
  2. Chestnutfits about as well
  3. Beansfits less well
  4. Peasfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, sage, pepper, butter, port wine. 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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