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To Gooslfy a Shoulder of Lamb

A lamb shoulder stuffed with onion, sage, pepper, salt, and butter, then roasted with gravy and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Sage and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,388 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

To Gooslfy a Shoulder of Lamb

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Stuff the shoulder bone with chopped onion, sage, pepper, salt, and butter.

  2. Stuff the mixture into the shank of the lamb.

Roast

  1. Place a little gravy in a dish and toast the lamb before a 400°F (200°C) fire.

  2. Baste the lamb with fresh butter while cooking.

  3. If using young lamb, sprinkle a little salt on top for crispiness.

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. Sage + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

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

  2. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  3. Lamb + peppertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,165 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Onion + sagetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,628 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Onion + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Lamb shoulder
Provides the main meat, which becomes tender and juicy during slow roasting.
Butter
Adds fat that carries flavour and promotes browning on the surface during cooking.
Onion
Adds sweetness and aromatic moisture to the stuffing as it cooks inside the meat.
Sage
Contributes a savoury, herbal aroma that flavours the lamb from within.

The step that matters

Baste the lamb with fresh butter while cooking. Basting spreads melted fat over the surface, helping it brown and stay moist. Without it, the outside can dry out and turn less golden before the centre is cooked through.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lamb, sage, pepper, butter):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Spinachfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lamb, sage, pepper, butter. 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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