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Mock Goose

A roast beef dish stuffed with sage and onion, soaked in port wine and vinegar, and basted with goose fat.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,092 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Mock Goose

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beef

  1. Cut the fillet or side of sirloin beef with a sharp knife to avoid ragged edges.

  2. Soak the beef in port wine and vinegar.

  3. Cut the beef open and stuff it with sage and chopped onion, then baste with goose fat.

Roast and serve

  1. Roast the beef over a brisk fire.

  2. Serve with onion sauce, gooseberry sauce, or apple sauce.

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. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  2. Port wine + vinegartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together598 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

  3. Sage + oniontop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,628 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Beef + port winetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together626 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  5. Vinegar + oniontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,226 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

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

What each ingredient does

Sirloin beef
Forms the main body of the dish and carries the flavour of the stuffing and marinade.
Port wine
Adds sweetness and depth to the soak, flavouring the meat from outside in.
Vinegar
Adds acidity to the soak, which can tenderise the surface of the meat and brighten its flavour.
Sage
Contributes a savoury, aromatic herbal flavour inside the stuffing.
Goose fat
Adds fat for basting, promoting browning and a rich, moist surface during roasting.

The step that matters

Roast the beef over a brisk fire. A brisk, hot fire browns the outside quickly through the Maillard reaction while the inside stays juicy. Too slow a heat dries and greys the meat before it develops colour and flavour.

Swap the sage

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, port wine, vinegar, onion):

  1. Garlicfits better
  2. Pepperfits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Sagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, port wine, vinegar, onion. 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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