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Leg of Mutton, Roasted

A roasted leg of mutton seasoned with flour, pepper, salt, and served with gravy and currant jelly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Mutton and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,442 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Leg of Mutton, Roasted

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mutton

  1. Wipe the leg of mutton very dry.

  2. Dredge it with flour and pepper.

  3. Cut off the knuckle.

  4. Remove the thick skin.

  5. Trim off the piece of flank.

Roast and serve

  1. Place the mutton in a dripping pan.

  2. Baste it with saltwater.

  3. Baste the meat every 10 minutes using the gravy from the meat itself.

  4. Serve with gravy and currant jelly on the side.

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. Mutton + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,442 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  2. Flour + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + curranttop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,077 recipes
  4. Mutton + curranttop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together393 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  5. Pepper + curranttop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,345 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

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

What each ingredient does

Leg of mutton
Is the main cut of meat that is roasted and carved for the dish.
Flour
Coats the surface so it can brown and form a light crust while roasting.
Currant jelly
Adds sweetness and tartness to balance the rich, savoury meat when served.

The step that matters

Wipe the leg of mutton very dry. Surface moisture steams the meat instead of letting it brown, and it also stops the flour dredge from clumping and sticking properly. A dry surface is needed for good browning in the oven.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Limefits better
  2. Lemonfits better
  3. Raisinfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, flour, 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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