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Lamb Cutlets in Aspic Jelly

A cold dish of lamb cutlets set in aspic with peas and garnish.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,053 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Lamb Cutlets in Aspic Jelly

Ingredients

Directions

Braise the cutlets

  1. Line the bottom of a stewpan with bacon, carrots, and onions.

  2. Trim the cutlets.

  3. Place the trimmed cutlets in the stewpan with cloves, peppercorns, mace, and parsley.

  4. Moisten the cutlets with sherry and enough stock to cover them.

  5. Simmer with the lid on until tender.

  6. Leave the cutlets in the cooking liquid until half cold.

  7. Drain the cutlets and place them between two plates with a weight on top.

Set in aspic

  1. Once cold, trim the cutlets.

  2. Pour a layer of aspic jelly in a sauté pan.

  3. When the jelly sets, lay the cutlets on the jelly.

  4. Cover the cutlets with another layer of jelly.

  5. Chill on ice until firm.

  6. Use a tin cutter to stamp out the cutlets, dipping it in hot water as needed.

Prepare the peas and serve

  1. Boil the peas until cooked.

  2. Drain the peas.

  3. Toss the peas with a little jelly over heat until coated.

  4. Place a circle of chopped jelly on a dish.

  5. Arrange the cutlets on the jelly circle.

  6. Add the peas in the center.

  7. Garnish with croutons of aspic jelly.

  8. Serve.

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. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Carrot + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,873 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

  4. Clove + parsleytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,768 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Clove + macetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

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

What each ingredient does

Lamb cutlets
Being the main meat, they become tender through slow simmering in liquid.
Aspic jelly
Sets around the cutlets to form a clear, firm glaze and coating.
Sherry
Adds acidity and aroma to the cooking liquid, flavouring the meat.
Clear stock
Provides the moist cooking liquid that tenderises the cutlets and forms the base for the aspic.
Bacon rashers
Contribute smoky, salty fat that flavours the cooking liquid and the meat.

The step that matters

Simmer with the lid on until tender. Gentle simmering in covered liquid breaks down the meat's connective tissue slowly. Boiling hard toughens the muscle fibres and can leave the cutlets dry and stringy.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lamb, carrot, onion, clove, parsley, sherry, peas):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Cuminfits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lamb, carrot, onion, clove, parsley, sherry, peas. 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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