Name: Boiled Leg of Mutton
Ingredients: leg of mutton; salt; butter; 1 cup strained pot-liquor; 1 tablespoon chopped cucumber pickle

Why it works: Mutton and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,781 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Boiled Leg of Mutton

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the mutton

Place the leg of mutton in a large pot of boiling water and add a little salt.
Cook for 15 minutes per pound.

Finish and serve

Once cooked, wipe the meat dry and rub it all over with butter.
For the sauce, combine the strained pot-liquor with chopped cucumber pickle.

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.

Mutton + buttertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,781 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Butter + cucumbertop 24% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,185 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).
Mutton + cucumbertop 26% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together202 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Leg of mutton: Is the main cut that is cooked whole, so its size sets the cooking time.
Butter: Adds richness and a glossy finish to the surface of the cooked meat.
Strained pot-liquor: Carries the cooking broth's savoury flavour into the sauce.
Cucumber pickle: Adds acidity and sharp flavour to balance the rich meat and broth.