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Quarter of Lamb Forced

A quarter of lamb leg stuffed with marrow, suet, oysters, anchovy, onion, herbs, and spices, roasted and served with a wine‑stock sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 19 ingredients
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Why it works: Mace and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,557 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Quarter of Lamb Forced

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the lamb

  1. Cut a long slit in the leg of lamb.

  2. Remove the meat without damaging the front.

  3. Chop the meat with marrow, beef suet, oysters, anchovy, onion, herbs, lemon peel, mace, and nutmeg.

  4. Beat the mixture in a mortar.

  5. Stuff the mixture back into the leg.

  6. Sew the leg up.

  7. Rub the stuffed leg with egg yolks.

Roast and fry

  1. Roast the leg for 1 hour, basting with butter.

  2. Cut the loin into steaks.

  3. Season the steaks with pepper, salt, nutmeg, lemon peel, and herbs.

  4. Fry the steaks in butter until golden brown.

  5. Remove the butter from the pan.

Make the sauce and serve

  1. Add white wine and strong stock to the pan, along with oysters, mushrooms, pickle, and the flour-butter mixture.

  2. Stir until thick.

  3. Place the stuffed leg of lamb in a dish.

  4. Arrange the steaks around the leg.

  5. Pour the sauce over the lamb.

  6. Garnish with lemon.

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. Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Lamb + beeftop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together896 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

  3. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  5. Oyster + anchovytop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together603 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Leg of lamb
Forms the outer roast that holds the stuffing and cooks as the main meat.
Egg yolks
Coat the surface, helping the stuffed leg brown and set during roasting.
Beef suet
Adds fat to the stuffing, keeping it moist and rich as it cooks.
Marrow
Adds richness and fat to the stuffing, keeping it moist and tender.
Butter
Basting fat that promotes browning and flavour on the roast and steaks.
Flour-rolled butter
Flour and butter thicken the sauce as it cooks, giving it body.

The step that matters

Stir the sauce until thick. Flour-butter thickens only as it heats, so it must simmer and be stirred to avoid lumps and a thin sauce.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lamb, beef, oyster, anchovy, onion, lemon, nutmeg):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against lamb, beef, oyster, anchovy, onion, lemon, nutmeg. 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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