Skip to main content
Main

Mutton Cutlets a LA Maintenon

Mutton cutlets stuffed with a mushroom and onion sauce, then broiled and served with Spanish sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Mutton Cutlets a LA Maintenon

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Make the mushroom filling

  1. Cook butter and onion together for 5 minutes.

  2. Add mushrooms, salt, and pepper, and cook for another 5 minutes.

  3. Stir in flour and mix well, then add stock and cook for 3 minutes.

  4. Let the mixture cool.

Prepare the cutlets

  1. Cut mutton cutlets from the ribs, 1.5 inches thick, and trim them.

  2. Split the cutlets with a sharp knife without separating them from the bone.

  3. Spread the cooled mixture inside the cutlets and press the cutlets together lightly.

Cook and serve

  1. Broil the cutlets over a clear fire for 8 minutes.

  2. Arrange the cutlets on a warm dish and pour Spanish sauce around them.

  3. Serve very hot.

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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Mushroom + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  3. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Mushroom + oniontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,626 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  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

Mutton cutlets (in the method)
Provide the main meat that is cooked and served.
Mushrooms
Add moisture and earthy flavour to the filling.
Butter
Adds richness and carries the flavour of the onion.
Flour
Thickens the stock into a stable filling that holds together.
Spanish sauce
Adds moisture and savoury richness to the plated dish.

The step that matters

Cooling the filling before spreading it. Warm filling would thin and loosen the flour-thickened mixture, making it run out of the split cutlets and soften the meat before broiling.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mushroom, butter, flour, parsley, pepper, sauce):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against mushroom, butter, flour, parsley, pepper, sauce. 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.

You might also like

Mushroom SoupMushroom Soup60 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesMutton BrothMutton Broth292 recipes