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Irish Stew

A hearty stew of mutton, potatoes, carrots, and water seasoned with salt and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Irish Stew

Why it works: Potato and carrot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,107 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓

Irish Stew

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the mutton into pieces.

  2. Peel and cut the potatoes into thick slices.

Make the stew

  1. Place the mutton and potatoes in a stewpan.

  2. Add water and carrots.

  3. Season with salt and pepper.

  4. Bring to a boil, then simmer gently for 2 hours.

Serve

  1. Serve very hot.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Potato + carrottop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,107 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  2. Carrot + peppertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

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

  3. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  4. Mutton + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,442 recipes

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

  5. Mutton + carrottop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,878 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

Neck of mutton
Provides the main meat and rich flavour as it slowly simmers.
Potatoes
Thicken the broth as they break down and add body to the stew.
Carrots
Add gentle sweetness and colour to the stew.

The step that matters

Simmer gently after boiling. A hard, rolling boil toughens meat fibres and can break up the potatoes, leaving the stew cloudy and uneven. A gentle simmer lets the mutton become tender while the broth stays clear.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, carrot, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Turnipfits better
  3. Parsnipfits about as well
  4. Potatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, carrot, 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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