Skip to main content
Main

Mutton, Shoulder Of, Stuffed

A boned mutton shoulder stuffed with pork and bacon sausage, braised with broth, herbs, and vegetables.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Pepper and carrot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,555 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Mutton, Shoulder Of, Stuffed

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the shoulder

  1. Trim excess fat from the boned shoulder of mutton and lay it flat on a board.

  2. Sprinkle the meat with pepper and coarse sea salt.

  3. Make sausage meat by mixing equal parts of lean pork and bacon, seasoned with pepper, salt, and a little mace; pound together.

  4. Stuff the shoulder with the sausage meat and shape it nicely, securing it with strong thread.

Braise

  1. In a large stewpan, heat the melted butter and brown the stuffed shoulder on both sides.

  2. Add the broth or water, bring to a boil, and skim off any foam.

  3. Add the savory herbs, onion, carrot, mushrooms, and cloves; simmer until done, basting often for the last half hour.

Serve

  1. Serve the meat on a hot dish, strain the gravy, remove excess fat, and keep the meat warm.

  2. Return the gravy to a small stewpan and boil until reduced; pour over the meat and garnish with glazed onions.

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

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

  2. Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

  3. Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  4. Pork + mushroomtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-propylphenol (allspice, anise).

  5. Carrot + mushroomtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,796 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Boned shoulder of mutton
Forms the main body of meat that becomes tender during slow simmering.
Lean pork and bacon
Make the sausage stuffing, adding moisture and fat to keep the filling juicy.
Melted butter
Fat that browns the outside of the shoulder and adds richness.
Broth or water
Liquid for simmering that becomes the gravy.
Button mushrooms
Add savory, earthy flavor to the cooking liquid that becomes the gravy.

The step that matters

Simmering the stuffed shoulder. Simmering gently keeps the connective tissue in the mutton breaking down slowly, so the meat becomes tender. A hard boil toughens the meat and can make the gravy cloudy.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Garlicfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, butter, pork, pepper, onion, carrot, mushroom. 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

Mutton BrothMutton Broth292 recipesCarrot SoupCarrot Soup134 recipesPork CakePork Cake107 recipesRoast PorkRoast Pork82 recipes