Why it works: Mutton and meat work together. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 936 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓
Boiled Leg of Mutton
Ingredients
Directions
Place the leg of mutton in a large pot and cover it with water.
Bring the water to a boil.
Cook for 1 hour for rare, adding 5 minutes for each additional pound.
Save the cooking water for soups.
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.
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Mutton + meattop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together936 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Mutton leg
- Provides the main meat, which becomes tender as it simmers in the water.
The step that matters
Cooking time by weight. Timing depends on the leg's weight, so adding time per extra pound keeps the meat from being undercooked. Cooking too briefly leaves the centre rare and tough, while the meat needs enough time for the connective tissue to soften.
“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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