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Lamb, Fricandeau of

A slow‑cooked lamb breast braised with herbs, bacon, and a reduced glaze.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,225 recipes. Both carry terpineol, which smells pine, woody. The science ↓

Lamb, Fricandeau of

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Lard the breast of lamb with the strips of fat bacon.

  2. Place the lamb in a stewpan with parsley, thyme, marjoram, green onions, peppercorns, bay leaf, and fat bacon.

  3. Add boiling water to barely cover the meat.

Braise and reduce

  1. Simmer gently for 30 minutes.

  2. Remove the meat.

  3. Boil the gravy quickly until reduced by half.

  4. Return the meat to the pan.

  5. Skim off the fat.

  6. Simmer gently until a glaze forms on top.

  7. Drain the lamb onto a dish.

  8. Keep it warm while reducing the sauce to a glaze.

Glaze and serve

  1. Brush the lamb with 2-3 coats of the glaze.

  2. Serve with dressed vegetables like sorrel, spinach, or green peas.

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. Thyme + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

  2. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Parsley + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,979 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Thyme + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,171 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Parsley + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Breast of lamb
Provides the main meat, which becomes tender through slow simmering.
Fat bacon
Adds fat and savoury flavour that enriches the meat and the gravy as it cooks.
Parsley
Contributes fresh, herbal aroma to the cooking liquid that flavours the meat.
Green onions
Add mild onion aroma to the cooking liquid, building savoury depth in the gravy.

The step that matters

Boiling the gravy until reduced by half. Reducing the liquid concentrates its flavour and gelatin, so it can set into a glaze. Boiling too hard or too long can make it overly salty or bitter, while too little reduction leaves a thin glaze that will not cling to the meat.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lamb, parsley, thyme, marjoram, meat):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against lamb, parsley, thyme, marjoram, meat. 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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