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Herrico of a Neck of Mutton

A soup made from mutton neck, carrots, turnips, celery, asparagus, fried lettuce, and cayenne pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Mutton and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and 5,442 recipes mention both. Both carry ethyl 2-methylbutyrate, which smells fruity, apple. The science ↓

The recipe

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mutton

  1. Cut the best end of the neck of mutton into chops along the ribs and flatten them.

  2. Fry the chops until light brown.

Make the soup

  1. Place the chops in a large saucepan with water and carrot slices.

  2. Stew for 15 minutes.

  3. Add turnips, celery, asparagus, and fried lettuce.

  4. Season with Cayenne.

  5. Boil until tender.

Serve

  1. Serve the gravy in a tureen or soup dish.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Mutton + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together5,442 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

  2. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together10,172 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Carrot + turniptop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together8,001 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Turnip + cabbagetop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together897 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Turnip + lettucetop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together526 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Neck of mutton
Provides the meat and bones that flavour the broth as it stews.
Turnips
Add body and a mildly sweet, earthy flavour as they soften.
Carrot
Adds sweetness and colour to the broth as it cooks.
Celery
Adds a fresh, savoury aroma to the broth.
Asparagus
Adds a green, grassy flavour and tender texture to the soup.

The step that matters

Fry the chops until light brown. Browning the meat creates Maillard reactions that add deeper, roasted flavour to the broth. Pale, under-browned chops produce a flatter-tasting soup.

Flavor stand-ins for the asparagus

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, carrot, turnip, celery, cabbage, lettuce, pepper):

  1. Leekbetter flavor fit
  2. Parsnipbetter flavor fit
  3. Broccolibetter flavor fit
  4. Asparagusthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, carrot, turnip, celery, cabbage, lettuce, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“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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