Boiled Leg of Mutton
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Tie the leg of mutton neatly with kitchen twine.
Boil and simmer
Place the mutton in a pot of boiling salted water.
After 5 minutes, add enough cold water to reduce the heat to half-boiling (170°F to 180°F).
Skim the surface to remove scum and add flavouring vegetables and herbs if desired.
Maintain a gentle simmer for 2 to 3 hours, ensuring occasional bubbles without vigorous boiling.
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
What each ingredient does
- Mutton leg
- Provides the main meat, which becomes tender through long, gentle simmering.
- Coarse sea salt
- Seasons the meat and the cooking water through the long simmer.
The step that matters
Maintain a gentle simmer. Vigorous boiling toughens meat proteins and can break the surface apart, while a gentle simmer at half-boiling temperature lets connective tissue soften slowly and keeps the meat moist and tender.
“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.
You might also like
Tomato Soup526 recipes
Brown Bread461 recipes
Mutton Broth292 recipes
Yorkshire Pudding264 recipesThe free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.