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Haricot of Mutton

A slow‑cooked mutton stew with potatoes, onions, thyme, parsley, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and parsley 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 ↓

Haricot of Mutton

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the breast of mutton into pieces.

  2. Toss the pieces in butter until slightly colored.

Make the stew

  1. Thicken the butter with flour.

  2. Return the meat to the pan and add stock, potatoes, onions, thyme, parsley, pepper, salt, bay leaf, and nutmeg.

  3. Simmer gently until cooked.

  4. Skim carefully and serve.

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. Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  3. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  4. Thyme + peppertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

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

  5. Potato + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,855 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Mutton breast
Provides the main meat, which becomes tender through slow simmering.
Butter
Carries flavor and browns the meat lightly before the liquid goes in.
Flour
Thickens the cooking butter and stock into a body-rich sauce.
Potatoes
Soften during simmering and add starch that further thickens the stew.
Onions
Add sweetness and aroma as they soften into the broth.

The step that matters

Simmer gently until cooked. A gentle simmer lets tough meat fibers break down slowly and evenly. A hard boil toughens proteins and makes the meat dry and stringy, while the broth can become cloudy.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, butter, flour, potato, thyme, parsley, pepper):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, butter, flour, potato, thyme, parsley, 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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