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Braised Leg of Mutton

A braised leg of mutton stuffed with veal forcemeat and mushrooms, cooked with vegetables and stock, served with gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and turnip match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,002 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Braised Leg of Mutton

Oven, in the book's wordsA rather quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare the stuffing

  1. Peel and chop the mushrooms, then mix the mushrooms with the veal forcemeat.

  2. Bone the mutton, fill the mutton with the stuffing, and bind the mutton with tape.

Braise

  1. Slice the vegetables and place them in the bottom of a stew pan.

  2. Lay the stuffed mutton on top of the vegetables and pour the stock over the mutton and vegetables.

  3. Cover the pan tightly and cook in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 3 hours.

  4. Remove the mutton from the pan.

  5. Boil the stock until it thickens to a glaze.

Finish the fillet

  1. Trim the fillet neatly, lard the fillet with bacon, and fry the unlarded side in butter with the sliced vegetables.

  2. Add the herbs and stock, cover with greased paper, and put on the lid.

  3. Bring to a boil, then simmer gently in the oven for about 1 to 2 hours until the veal is tender.

  4. Remove the fillet to a dripping tin and strain a little stock over the fillet.

  5. Return the fillet to the oven to crisp the bacon and baste and allow the fillet to brown.

Make the gravy and serve

  1. Strain the remaining gravy and remove the fat from the gravy.

  2. Reduce the gravy to half glaze by boiling or thicken with arrowroot, then season the gravy.

  3. Serve the fricandeau on a slice of bread, garnished with boiled carrot and turnip, with the gravy strained around.

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 + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Turnip + oniontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Tomato + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,606 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Mushroom + tomatotop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,719 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

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

What each ingredient does

Leg of mutton
Forms the main meat that is boned, stuffed, and slowly braised until tender.
Veal forcemeat
Adds a soft, moist stuffing that stays tender inside the rolled meat.
Mushrooms
Add moisture and savoury flavour to the stuffing.
Strong stock
Provides liquid for braising and reduces to a glaze that flavours the gravy.
Bacon
Larding adds fat that crisps and browns the surface of the fillet.
Butter
Fat for frying the unlarded side, helping it brown.

The step that matters

Covering and simmering the fillet gently. Tough meat needs long, low, moist heat to break down connective tissue; boiling hard or letting liquid dry out leaves it dry and firm rather than tender.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, mushroom, veal, carrot, turnip, onion, butter):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, mushroom, veal, carrot, turnip, onion, 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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