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Lamb — Continued

A pastry-covered lamb pie with ham, eggs, and gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Lamb and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,165 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Lamb — Continued

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Grease a pie dish with butter and layer the bottom with raw ham, sprinkling with cayenne pepper.

Assemble and bake

  1. Place the lamb slices on top, then add the halved hard-boiled eggs.

  2. Pour in the cold gravy until it reaches half the height of the meat.

  3. Cover the pie with pastry and bake for 10 minutes.

  4. Cover with paper and return to the oven to bake for 1 hour.

Serve

  1. Remove the paper before serving and place the pie dish on a flat dish.

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

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

  2. Lamb + hamtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together160 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  3. Ham + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,475 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  4. Ham + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,526 recipes

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

  5. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 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
Forms the main body of the pie and provides the rich, savory meat flavor.
Raw ham
Adds salty, savory flavor that seasons the meat and gravy as the pie bakes.
Hard-boiled eggs
Add richness and a firm, sliced texture to the filling.
Cold gravy
Supplies moisture and body that keeps the meat from drying out during baking.
Pastry
Forms a crisp, golden covering that seals in the filling's moisture.

The step that matters

Cover with paper and bake for 1 hour. Once the pastry has been baked for 10 minutes, covering it with paper shields it from over-browning during the long bake, while the filling cooks through gently.

“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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