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Boiled Goose

A goose cooked in milk, water, and broth, then served cold with sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Why it works: Sage and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 887 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Boiled Goose

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the goose

  1. Dress the goose.

  2. Singe the goose.

  3. Place the goose in a deep dish and cover with boiling milk.

  4. Leave the goose overnight.

  5. In the morning, wash off the milk from the goose.

  6. Wash the goose with warm water.

  7. Dry the goose with a cloth.

  8. Fill the goose's body with a dressing of bread crumbs, pepper, salt, butter, chopped onions, and sage.

Boil the goose

  1. Place the goose in cold water on the fire.

  2. Once the water is boiling, remove the goose.

  3. Put the goose back in cold water and boil gently until tender.

  4. Serve the goose with giblet sauce, pickles, or acid jelly.

Make the broth

  1. Cook 4 calves' feet in 3 quarts of water.

  2. Boil the broth down slowly.

  3. Strain the broth.

Cook and set the meat

  1. Place the goose in a pot.

  2. Cover the goose with the calves' feet broth and enough water.

  3. Add vinegar, spices, onion, and lemon peel to the pot.

  4. Cover and boil slowly until the goose is soft.

  5. Let the goose cool in the broth.

  6. Remove the goose from the pot.

  7. Cut the meat off the bones.

  8. Arrange the meat in a deep dish.

  9. Skim the fat from the broth.

  10. Taste the broth.

  11. Adjust vinegar and salt as needed.

  12. Strain the broth again.

  13. Pour the broth over the meat.

  14. Let the meat set for 24 hours.

  15. Serve cold with bread or crackers.

  16. If using gelatine, dissolve 3 ounces in cold water after the goose is soft.

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 + lemontop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together887 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  3. Pepper + sagetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

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

  4. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  5. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

What each ingredient does

Goose
Is the main protein that becomes tender through long, gentle simmering.
Calves' feet
Their gelatin-rich broth lets the cooled meat set into a firm jelly.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the flavour and helps balance the rich meat and fat.
Bread crumbs
Soak up juices and fat in the stuffing, keeping the filling moist and light.
Butter
Adds fat to the stuffing, contributing richness and a softer texture.
Gelatine
Adds extra setting power so the cooled broth holds its jelly shape.

The step that matters

Cook the goose gently until soft. A rolling boil toughens and breaks up the meat, while slow simmering lets collagen break down into tender meat and gelatin for the jelly.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, bread, pepper, butter, sage, vinegar, 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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