Name: Mutton, Minced and Baked
Ingredients: 1½ pounds mutton (cold roast leg preferred); 1 teaspoon savory herbs; 1 blade pounded mace; 2 shallots (shredded) or 1 onion (finely chopped); meat gravy (to moisten); a little flour (to thicken gravy); pepper (to taste); coarse sea salt (to taste); mashed potatoes (for layering)

Why it works: Shallot and flour match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,081 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Mutton, Minced and Baked

Ingredients

1½ pounds mutton (cold roast leg preferred)
1 teaspoon savory herbs
1 blade pounded mace
2 shallots (shredded) or 1 onion (finely chopped)
meat gravy (to moisten)
a little flour (to thicken gravy)
pepper (to taste)
coarse sea salt (to taste)
mashed potatoes (for layering)

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.

Prepare the filling

Mince the mutton, removing excess fat.
Mix in savory herbs, pounded mace, shallots or onion, meat gravy, and a little flour.
Season with pepper and coarse sea salt.

Assemble and bake

In a pie dish, layer mashed potatoes and minced mutton, starting and finishing with potatoes.
Bake at 350°F (175°C) for 30 minutes.

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.

Shallot + flourtop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,081 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Shallot + potatotop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together272 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Pepper + potatotop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,305 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Shallot + peppertop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,898 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Mutton + meattop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together936 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

Mutton: Provides the savory, meaty body of the filling.
Mashed potatoes: Form the layers that bind the dish and give a soft, moist texture.
Meat gravy: Moistens the minced meat and carries flavor through the filling.
Flour: Thickens the gravy so the filling holds together rather than running loose.
Shallots or onion: Add aromatic sweetness and depth to the filling.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, shallot, meat, flour, pepper, potato):

Capersfits better
Parsleyfits better
Turmericfits better
Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, shallot, meat, flour, pepper, potato. 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.