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Roast Lamb

A lamb hind quarter roasted with butter, salt, pepper, and water, served with a mint or pickle butter sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Lamb and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,165 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Roast Lamb

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Rub the lamb with butter, coarse sea salt, and black pepper.

  2. Place 1 pint of water and a little lard or butter in the dripping pan.

Roast

  1. Roast the lamb for about 15 minutes per pound, basting often.

  2. Ensure the lamb is cooked thoroughly.

Make the sauce

  1. For the sauce, pick, wash, and finely shred fresh mint.

  2. Mix the mint with 1 tablespoon of sugar and 4 tablespoons of vinegar.

  3. Alternatively, chop hard pickles to the size of capers and mix with ½ pint of melted butter and 1 teaspoon of vinegar.

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. Lamb + peppertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,165 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Lamb + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Lamb
Is the main cut, and slow roasting with basting keeps the meat moist and tender.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and helps the surface brown during roasting.
Vinegar
Adds sharpness that balances the sweetness and richness of the sauce.
Sugar
Adds sweetness that softens the sharp taste of the vinegar in the mint sauce.

The step that matters

Ensure the lamb is cooked thoroughly. Lamb can be served at several doneness levels, and undercooked meat may carry food-safety risks. Checking the centre of the thickest part with a thermometer shows whether it has reached a safe temperature, and resting the meat before carving helps juices redistribute.

“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.

More roast lamb recipes

Quarter 15Shoulder 15Forequarter 13with Mint Sauce 7Fore Quarter 3Leg 3 See all 71 →

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