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Roasting

A method for roasting a joint of meat over a fire, using butter, salt, and basting.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Meat and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,594 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Roasting

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. An hour before cooking, clear the grate of ashes and prepare a fire suitable for roasting.

  2. Wash the meat in salt water and dry it thoroughly.

  3. Remove excess fat, leaving enough for basting, and cover the meat with buttered paper tied with twine.

Roast

  1. Hang the joint on the hook of the jack, ensuring even exposure to the fire.

  2. Baste the meat frequently with the dripping fat as it melts. If dripping is scarce, use butter for basting.

  3. Remove excess dripping from the pan before it scorches.

  4. Roast for about 15 minutes per pound, adjusting time based on the type of meat.

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. Meat + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,594 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Meat
The main joint; its fat melts and drips to baste it as it roasts.
Butter
Adds fat for basting and, under buttered paper, keeps the surface from drying out.

The step that matters

Basting with dripping fat. Fat spooned over the surface carries heat and keeps the meat moist, while excess dripping left in the pan can scorch and taste bitter.

“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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