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Boast Lamb with Sobbel-sauce

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and sorrel work together. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 419 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Boast Lamb with Sobbel-sauce

Oven, in the book's wordsA very hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a very hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

  1. Have the bone cut from the shoulder of lamb without mangling it.

  2. Replace the bone with seasoned bread crumbs and sew or tie the lamb to enclose the crumbs.

  3. Place the lamb on a spit or in a pan just large enough to hold it.

  4. Roast it before a hot fire or bake it in a very hot oven at 400°F (200°C).

  5. Season the meat with salt and pepper when it is brown.

  6. Cook for about 15 minutes per pound for medium well done.

  7. While the lamb is cooking, prepare the sorrel-sauce.

  8. Once done, remove the strings and serve the lamb on the sorrel-sauce.

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 + sorreltop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together419 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Lamb + peppertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,165 recipes

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

  3. Lamb + breadtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together598 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  4. Bread + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,964 recipes

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

  5. Lamb + sorreltop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together35 recipes

    Shared aroma: geraniol (rose, geranium).

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

Swap the sorrel

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lamb, bread, pepper, sauce):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Garlicfits better
  3. Capersfits better
  4. Sorrelthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lamb, bread, pepper, sauce. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

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