Skip to main content
Main

Irish Stew

A slow‑cooked stew of mutton, potatoes, onions, curry paste, dried apricots, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Hamilton, Margaret · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Irish Stew

Why it works: Lemon and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Irish Stew

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the mutton and potatoes

  1. Place diced mutton in a saucepan with cold water, enough to cover. Bring to a boil over medium heat, then skim off any foam.

  2. Add large potatoes to the pot. Reduce heat and simmer slowly for about two hours.

  3. Mash the potatoes finely. Add sliced onions and whole small potatoes on top. Season with salt and pepper. Continue to boil for another hour.

Make the curry mixture

  1. Soak or boil dried apricots until softened, then cut into small pieces.

  2. In a bowl, mix curry paste, curry powder, dried cocoa, lemon rind, milk, sugar, pepper, and salt.

Finish and serve

  1. Add browned onions to the saucepan, stir for a few minutes, then add the mutton and apricot mixture. Add the remaining ingredients (including the mashed potatoes, bay leaves, and any other items). Mix well and cover closely.

  2. Simmer gently over a slow fire for 2 hours.

  3. Serve with boiled rice and chutney.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

216Calories
9 gProtein
8 gFat
30 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 5 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Lemonjuice of 1 lemon (48ml)12
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Salt1 tsp (6g)0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Hamilton, Margaret. 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. See the original page.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

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

  2. Cocoa + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together643 recipes

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

  3. Lemon + milktop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Cocoa + peppertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together32 recipes

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

  5. Lemon + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Lemon and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Mutton (in the method)
Provides the main meat and savoury flavour, becoming tender with long, gentle simmering.
Potatoes (in the method)
Mashing them into the liquid thickens the stew and gives it a creamy body.
Onions (in the method)
Browning builds sweetness and depth of flavour before they join the stew.
Dried apricots
Add sweetness and a fruity note that balances the curry spices.
Milk
Adds richness and softens the spiced curry flavours.

The step that matters

Simmering gently with the pot covered. A hard boil toughens meat proteins and can scorch the base, while a gentle, covered simmer lets the mutton become tender and the flavours blend evenly.

Swap the cocoa

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lemon, milk, sugar, pepper):

  1. Chickpeafits better
  2. Milletfits better
  3. Chestnutfits better
  4. Cocoathe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lemon, milk, sugar, 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.

You might also like

Lemon SauceLemon Sauce236 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesMutton BrothMutton Broth292 recipes