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To Roast Mutton Like Venison

A method of roasting a fat hind quarter of mutton with salt, saltpetre, allspice, red wine, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Red wine and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,599 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

To Roast Mutton Like Venison

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Rub the mutton with salt and saltpetre.

  2. Hang it in a moist place for two days, wiping it with a clean cloth two or three times a day.

  3. Boil allspice in red wine, then pour it hot over the mutton and cover it tightly for two hours.

Roast and baste

  1. Remove the mutton, skewer it, and roast it over a fire, basting constantly with the same liquid and butter.

  2. If using a good quick fire, it will be ready in about an hour and a half.

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. Red wine + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,599 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Mutton + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,781 recipes

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

  3. Allspice + red winetop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together120 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyl acetate (fruit).

  4. Mutton + red winetop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together117 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

  5. Allspice + buttertop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,325 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Mutton
Provides the main meat, which becomes tender and juicy during the long marinating and roasting.
Saltpetre
Helps preserve the meat and gives it a characteristic pink colour during curing.
Red wine
Adds acidity and moisture, and carries the allspice flavour into the meat during the soak.
Allspice
Adds warm, aromatic spice flavour that infuses the wine and meat.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, helping the surface brown while basting.

The step that matters

Basting during the roast. Constant basting keeps the surface moist and encourages even browning, so the outside does not dry out or burn before the interior is cooked.

Swap the allspice

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, red wine, butter):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Rosemaryfits better
  3. Pepperfits better
  4. Allspicethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, red wine, butter. 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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