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Mutton Scallop

A baked dish of mutton with tomato sauce and bread crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Mutton Scallop

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Melt the butter in a pan.

  2. Add the bread crumbs and stir until thoroughly greased.

  3. Season the meat with salt, pepper, and onion juice or other seasoning.

Assemble and bake

  1. In a greased baking dish, layer the meat, tomato sauce, and bread crumbs alternately, finishing with a layer of bread crumbs on top.

  2. Bake for 20 minutes at 400°F (200°C) and serve.

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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  3. Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

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

  4. Tomato + breadtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,013 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Cooked meat
Forms the bulk of the dish and gives it its savory, meaty body.
Tomato sauce
Adds moisture and acidity that keep the layers from drying out in the oven.
Bread crumbs
Absorb the butter and juices, adding structure and a lightly browned top layer.
Butter
Coats the crumbs so they brown evenly and add richness.

The step that matters

Greasing the bread crumbs. Stirring the crumbs until every piece is coated with butter helps them brown evenly and keeps them from turning soggy when layered with the moist meat and sauce.

Swap the onion

The recipe marks onion as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, tomato, sauce, bread, butter, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits about as well
  3. Asparagusfits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, tomato, sauce, bread, butter, pepper. 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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