Why it works: Parsley and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓
Roast Pig
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Wash the pig well and stuff it with the potato stuffing.
To make the stuffing, mix mashed potatoes, softened butter, chopped onion, pepper, salt, and sage.
Stuff the pig and sew it closed.
Skewer the fore legs forward and the hind legs backward.
Roast
Rub the pig with softened butter and sprinkle with flour, salt, and pepper.
Place the pig in a 400°F (200°C) oven with a little water in the pan.
Baste often with melted butter to soften the skin.
Bake for about 3 hours or until tender when tested with a fork.
Serve
Arrange the pig on a platter in a bed of parsley, with a slice of lemon in its mouth.
Serve with apple sauce or fried apples.
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.
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Parsley + lemontop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together14,037 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
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Sage + parsleytop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together1,445 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
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Sage + lemontop 2% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together887 recipes
Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
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Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together34,122 recipes
Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
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Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together27,047 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Pig
- Is the main cooked item, and its flesh becomes tender and juicy during long, slow roasting.
- Mashed potatoes
- Form a moist, starchy stuffing that keeps the inside of the pig tender and flavorful.
- Butter
- Adds richness and moisture, and helps the skin brown and crisp when basted.
- Flour
- Sprinkled on the skin, it helps the surface brown and crisp during roasting.
- Sage
- Adds a savory, aromatic herb flavor to the potato stuffing.
- Onion
- Adds savory sweetness and aroma to the potato stuffing as it cooks inside the pig.
The step that matters
Bake until tender, basting often. A whole pig is dense, so it needs long, moderate heat to cook through. Frequent basting with melted butter keeps the skin from drying and helps it brown.
Swap the onion
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (potato, butter, pepper, sage, flour, parsley, lemon):
- Shallotfits better
- Carrotfits better
- Chivefits better
- Onionthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against potato, butter, pepper, sage, flour, parsley, lemon. 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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