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Lamb Cutlets with Cucumbers

Lamb cutlets coated in breadcrumbs and fried, served with cucumber sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Lamb Cutlets with Cucumbers

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chops

  1. Remove the bone from the loin of lamb and cut it into chops.

  2. Flatten the chops with a chopper and trim off some fat.

Season and cook

  1. In a pan, melt fresh butter and add chopped parsley, thyme, shallots, lemon juice, pepper, and coarse sea salt.

  2. Cook the chops in the mixture until three-quarters done, then place them on a dish to cool.

Coat, fry and serve

  1. Dip the cooled chops in egg, coat with breadcrumbs, and fry in boiling lard until light brown.

  2. Drain the cutlets and arrange them in a dish, serving with cucumber sauce in the center.

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. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Parsley + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Thyme + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,973 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Parsley + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,737 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Thyme + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,476 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Loin of lamb
Forms the meat of the cutlets, cooked to tender, juicy chops.
Fresh butter
Carries the herbs and aromatics and adds richness to the lamb.
Egg
Binds the breadcrumb coating so it adheres to the chops during frying.
Breadcrumbs
Forms a crisp, golden-brown crust when fried.
Boiling lard
Fries the coated chops, conducting heat to brown and crisp the crust.

The step that matters

Frying in boiling lard until light brown. The lard must be hot enough to set the egg and breadcrumb coating quickly. If it is too cool, the coating absorbs fat and turns greasy and soggy. Frying only until light brown keeps the lamb from overcooking, since the chops were already partly cooked earlier.

Swap the shallot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lamb, butter, parsley, thyme, lemon, pepper, egg):

  1. Shallotthe original
  2. Spinachfits about as well
  3. Asparagusfits about as well
  4. Carrotfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against lamb, butter, parsley, thyme, lemon, pepper, egg. 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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