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Mutton Stew

A stew of mutton with carrots, potatoes, onions, tomato juice, and optional pork or ham, baked after boiling.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Mutton Stew

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Brown the mutton

  1. Heat the lard in a saucepan, add the mutton, salt, and pepper, and cook until light brown.

  2. Pour off the fat, sprinkle flour over the meat, and cook for 2 minutes, stirring.

Make the stew

  1. Add water and tomato juice, stir, and boil for 3 minutes.

  2. Add carrots, potatoes, browned onions, optional pork or ham, and soup herbs.

  3. Cover and boil for a few minutes, then place in a 350°F (175°C) oven for 1 hour.

  4. Remove from the oven, skim off fat, take out the herbs, and add green peas before serving.

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. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  2. Carrot + potatotop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,107 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  3. Tomato + potatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,798 recipes

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

  4. Pepper + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

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

  5. Tomato + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,606 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
Provides the main meat, which becomes tender during the long, slow cooking.
Flour
Thickens the cooking liquid into a richer, smoother stew body.
Tomato juice
Adds acidity and savory flavor to the liquid as it simmers with the meat.
Potatoes
Soften during cooking and help thicken the stew while adding body.
Onions
Add sweetness and depth of flavor once browned in butter.

The step that matters

Browning the mutton in hot lard. Searing the meat until light brown builds browned, savory flavors through the Maillard reaction, which give the finished stew depth. Pale meat results in a flatter taste.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, pepper, flour, carrot, potato, onion, butter):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Turnipfits better
  3. Chivefits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, pepper, flour, carrot, potato, onion, butter. 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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