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Sage and Onion Sauce

A savory sauce made with onions, sage, breadcrumbs, butter, and brown stock, suitable for roast pork or goose.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 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 ↓

Sage and Onion Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Cut the onions into small dice.

  2. Melt the butter or fat in a pan and add the onions.

  3. Cook the onions slowly until they are brown.

  4. Add the brown stock and bring to a boil.

  5. Stir in the sage, breadcrumbs, salt, and pepper.

  6. Simmer for about 10 minutes.

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. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  3. Onion + sagetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,628 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Onion + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Butter + sagetop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,312 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

What each ingredient does

Onions
Browning slowly builds sweetness and deep savory flavour that gives the sauce its body.
Breadcrumbs
Absorb liquid and thicken the sauce as they simmer.
Butter
Carries the onions while they brown and adds richness.
Brown stock
Forms the liquid base that the breadcrumbs thicken during simmering.
Sage
Adds a fragrant herbal aroma that flavours the sauce.

The step that matters

Cook the onions slowly until brown. Onions cooked too fast over high heat scorch on the outside before their sugars develop evenly, leaving a bitter taste. Slow cooking caramelises the sugars gradually, giving the sauce a sweet, deep flavour.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Sweet potatofits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sage, 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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