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To Dress a Haunch of Mutton

A marinated haunch of mutton prepared with currant jelly, red wine, sugar, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Red wine and vinegar work together. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 575 recipes. Both carry sotolon, which smells curry, maple. The science ↓

To Dress a Haunch of Mutton

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mutton

  1. Hang the haunch of mutton for two weeks.

  2. Dress the haunch of mutton as you would for a haunch of venison.

Make the sauce

  1. Warm the currant jelly for the sauce.

  2. Simmer red wine and sugar over medium heat for 5–6 minutes.

  3. Simmer vinegar and sugar until it reaches a syrup consistency.

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. Red wine + vinegartop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together575 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  2. Currant + vinegartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together693 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  3. Currant + red winetop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together113 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  4. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Mutton + red winetop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together117 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

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

What each ingredient does

Haunch of mutton
The main meat, which hanging and marinating help tenderise and flavour.
Currant jelly
Adds sweetness and a tart, fruity flavour to the sauce.
Red wine
Adds acidity and depth of flavour as it reduces.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the liquids thicken into a syrup as they reduce.
Vinegar
Adds sharp acidity that balances the sweetness and richness of the meat.

The step that matters

Simmer the vinegar and sugar to a syrup. As water evaporates, sugar concentrates and can scorch and turn bitter if overcooked. Undercooked syrup stays thin and will not cling to the meat well.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, red wine, sugar, vinegar):

  1. Plumfits better
  2. Pearfits better
  3. Applefits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, red wine, sugar, vinegar. 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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