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Roast Saddle of Mutton

A roasted saddle of mutton, seasoned with sea salt and dusted with flour, baked until tender.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Roast Saddle of Mutton

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat your oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. If the butcher has not done so, carefully remove the skin from the saddle of mutton and skewer it back on.

Roast

  1. Roast the mutton, basting it frequently to keep it moist.

  2. Ensure the joint is kept at a distance from the fire to prevent burning the fat.

  3. About 30 minutes before the mutton is done, remove the skin and lightly dust the joint with flour.

  4. Roast for 2 to 2½ hours, depending on the size of the joint.

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. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  3. Mutton + flourtop 29% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,695 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (grass, green).

Flour and butter 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; long roasting turns its connective tissue tender and juicy.
Butter or oil
Carries heat over the surface and adds moisture and richness when basted.
Flour
Dusted on the surface late in roasting to help the exterior brown and form a crisp crust.

The step that matters

Keeping the joint away from the fire. Too much direct heat scorches the surface and fat before the thick joint cooks through. Keeping it at a distance lets heat penetrate evenly, so the fat browns without burning.

“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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