Skip to main content
Main

Small Mutton Pies

Small pies filled with stewed mutton, suet, and optional onions, served baked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Shallot and flour match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,081 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Small Mutton Pies

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure. The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare the filling

  1. Sprinkle mutton slices with salt and pepper and place the seasoned mutton in a saucepan with sliced fat.

  2. Stew over moderate heat until tender.

  3. Remove the pan from heat, transfer it to a slow oven and let the meat cool completely.

  4. Skim off excess fat.

  5. Add gravy and port wine to the cooled meat.

  6. Mix in onions and shallot if desired.

Make the crust

  1. Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a bowl, combine chopped suet with boiling milk and stir well.

  3. Mix in flour and salt.

  4. Knead the dough until smooth.

  5. Roll out the dough to about ½ inch thick.

Assemble and bake

  1. Line greased patty pans with dough.

  2. Fill each pan with the mutton mixture.

  3. Brush edges with milk.

  4. Cover with dough rounds and press edges to seal.

  5. Make a small hole in the center of each pie.

  6. Brush tops with milk.

  7. Bake in the oven for 45 minutes until golden brown.

  8. Remove from tins and serve on a napkin or decorative paper.

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. Shallot + flourtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,081 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  3. Onion + shallottop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,431 recipes

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

  4. Port wine + shallottop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together380 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + beeftop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Mutton
Provides the rich, tender meat that forms the filling after slow stewing.
Flour
Forms the structure of the dough that encloses the filling.
Suet
Adds fat to the dough, making it short and tender when baked.
Port wine
Adds sweetness and depth of flavour to the mutton filling.

The step that matters

Let the meat cool completely before filling. Filling hot meat into raw dough can melt the fat and make the crust greasy and soggy, so the meat should be fully cooled first.

Swap the onion

The recipe marks onion as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, pepper, beef, port wine, shallot, flour, milk):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, pepper, beef, port wine, shallot, flour, milk. 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.

You might also like

Beef, Mutton, or Veal BrothBeef, Mutton, or Veal Broth6 recipesMutton BrothMutton Broth292 recipesRoast BeefRoast Beef211 recipesBeef LoafBeef Loaf175 recipes