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Mutton Bekobbed

A roast mutton loin seasoned, coated with breadcrumbs, and served with a ketchup‑floured gravy.

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 Bekobbed

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mutton

  1. Remove the fat and skin from the loin of mutton and joint it completely.

  2. Mix grated nutmeg with salt, pepper, bread crumbs, and herbs.

  3. Dip the steaks in the egg yolk and sprinkle the mixture over them.

  4. Reassemble the steaks, tie them together, and fasten on a small spit.

Roast and serve

  1. Roast before a hot fire, basting with butter and the meat's juices.

  2. Once done, prepare ½ pint of gravy and mix in 2 tablespoons of ketchup and 1 teaspoon of flour.

  3. Boil the gravy and pour it over the mutton after skimming off the fat.

  4. Garnish with pickles.

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. Nutmeg + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  3. Nutmeg + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Mutton + breadtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,488 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Mutton loin
Forms the main body of the dish, cooked as tender meat in the joint.
Egg yolk
Binds the herb and crumb coating so it adheres to the steaks.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp coating that browns during roasting.
Butter
Adds fat for basting, promoting browning and rich flavour on the surface.
Flour
Thickens the gravy so it coats the meat.

The step that matters

Roast before a hot fire, basting with butter and the meat's juices.. High heat browns the crumb coating and surface proteins, while regular basting keeps the exposed meat moist and adds flavour as the fat renders.

Swap the nutmeg

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

  1. Parsleyfits about as well
  2. Nutmegthe original
  3. Capersfits about as well
  4. Marjoramfits less well

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