Why it works: Flour and capers match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,024 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Boiled Leg of Mutton
Ingredients
Directions
Cook the mutton
Trim the shank of the leg of mutton to a suitable length.
Wrap the mutton in mosquito net or tarlatan tightly.
Boil in plenty of salted water for 15 minutes per pound.
Unwrap the mutton.
Place the mutton on a hot dish.
Butter the mutton all over.
Sprinkle the mutton lightly with salt.
Twist frilled paper around the end of the shank.
Make the caper sauce
Strain 1 cup of the cooking liquid for the caper sauce.
Heat the strained liquid.
Skim the liquid.
Stir in 2 tablespoons of butter mixed with 1 teaspoon of flour and pepper.
Bring the sauce to a boil.
Pour the beaten egg over the sauce and stir for 1 minute.
Add the capers or nasturtium seeds.
Pour the sauce into a sauceboat.
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.
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Flour + caperstop 6% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together1,024 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
-
Pepper + caperstop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,088 recipes
Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
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Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
-
Butter + caperstop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,637 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Mutton
- Forms the main body of the dish, cooked gently in salted water until tender.
- Butter
- Adds richness and a smooth, rounded flavour to the mutton and the sauce.
- Flour
- Thickens the cooking liquid into a smooth sauce.
- Beaten egg
- Enriches and thickens the sauce as it sets gently when stirred in.
- Capers or nasturtium seeds
- Add a sharp, tangy acidity that cuts the richness of the mutton and sauce.
The step that matters
Pour the beaten egg over the sauce and stir for 1 minute. Egg proteins set with heat and can curdle or turn grainy if the sauce is too hot or the egg is added too quickly. Pour slowly and stir constantly to keep the sauce smooth.
Swap the capers
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, butter, flour, pepper, egg):
- Parsleyfits better
- Nutmegfits about as well
- Turmericfits about as well
- Capersthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, butter, flour, pepper, egg. 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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