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Cold Mutton Potted

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and arrowroot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 159 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Cold Mutton Potted

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Cut the cold mutton into pieces, removing skin and sinew.

  2. Chop the mutton finely with a little cold ham.

  3. Season with pepper, coarse sea salt, and grated nutmeg.

  4. Heat the mixture in an enamelled pan, adding good gravy, water, and enough arrowroot to form a thick paste.

  5. Press the mixture into small pots or a mold.

  6. If storing, cover with clarified butter for preservation.

  7. Add a little anchovy for extra flavor, if desired.

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. Nutmeg + arrowroottop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together159 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  3. Mutton + anchovytop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together170 recipes

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

  4. Butter + anchovytop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,697 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Pepper + arrowroottop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together329 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

Swap the arrowroot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, ham, pepper, nutmeg, butter, anchovy):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Spinachfits better
  4. Arrowrootthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, ham, pepper, nutmeg, butter, anchovy. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

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