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Mutton Boulettes

A dish of mutton, potatoes, and herbs formed into balls, coated in breadcrumbs, and fried.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 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 Boulettes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Soak the bread crumbs in milk.

  2. Mix the soaked bread crumbs with the boiled mutton, chopped potatoes, herbs, salt, and pepper using a wooden spoon.

  3. Take a spoonful of the mixture and roll it into a ball on a floured surface.

Coat and fry

  1. Dip each ball in beaten egg, then coat with bread crumbs.

  2. Melt the butter or fat in a frying pan.

  3. Fry the boulettes until brown and serve with sauce piquante or tomato sauce.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

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

  4. Milk + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

  5. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Boiled mutton
Forms the main body and savory flavor of the boulettes.
Bread crumbs
Soaked in milk, they bind the mixture and keep the centre moist.
Beaten yolks of eggs
Bind the coating so the bread crumbs stick and help it brown when fried.
Butter or fat
Conducts heat for frying and browns the outside, adding richness.

The step that matters

Frying the boulettes until brown. Frying in enough hot fat browns the coating through the Maillard reaction, creating flavour and a crisp crust. Too little heat leaves them greasy and pale, while too much can scorch the crumbs before the centre is heated through.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, milk, mutton, pepper, egg, flour, butter):

  1. Asparagusfits about as well
  2. Leekfits about as well
  3. Potatothe original
  4. Capsicumfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, milk, mutton, pepper, egg, flour, butter. 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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