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A Roast Pig

A whole pig stuffed with a seasoned mixture of crackers, sage, savory, onion, cream, eggs, and spices, then roasted.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Sage and summer savory match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 237 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

A Roast Pig

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut off the toes of the pig, leaving the skin long to wrap around the ends of the legs, and soak it in cold water.

  2. In a pot, combine the powdered crackers, sage, summer savory, chopped onion, cream, eggs, pepper, and salt. Mix well and stew for 15 minutes.

  3. Remove the pig from the water, fill it with the stuffing, and sew it up.

Make the gravy

  1. Boil the liver and heart with the peppercorns, then chop finely for the gravy.

Roast

  1. Place the pig in a roasting pan with 1 pint of water and 1 tablespoon of salt.

  2. Once it begins to roast, flour the pig well and baste it with the drippings.

  3. Roast for 3 hours.

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 + summer savorytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together237 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Sage + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Summer savory + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together671 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Summer savory + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together299 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  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

Whole pig
Is the main meat, cooked whole so the stuffing and skin bake around it.
Eggs
Bind the stuffing so it holds together and sets lightly when cooked.
Powdered crackers
Soak up the cream and eggs, giving the stuffing body and a soft texture.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness to the stuffing, keeping it tender as it cooks.
Chopped onion
Adds savory sweetness and aroma to the stuffing as it stews.

The step that matters

Roast for 3 hours. A whole pig is dense, and the thickest parts cook slowly. Too little time leaves the stuffing and meat undercooked, while the outer skin can brown too fast if heat is too high, so check the stuffing's temperature rather than relying on color alone.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sage, summer savory, cream, egg, pepper):

  1. Spinachfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Turnipfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sage, summer savory, cream, egg, pepper. 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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