Name: To Roast Mutton Venison-fashion
Ingredients: 1 hind quarter of fat mutton; 1 bottle of red wine; butter; gravy (for serving); sweet sauce (for serving)

Why it works: Butter and sauce are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 15,338 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

To Roast Mutton Venison-fashion

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

Cut the leg of the mutton like a haunch and place it in a pan, back side down.
Pour the red wine over the mutton and let it marinate for 24 hours.

Roast and serve

Spit the mutton and baste it with the wine and butter while roasting.
Roast at 400°F (200°C) for 1.5 hours.
Serve with gravy and sweet sauce.

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.

Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together15,338 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Red wine + buttertop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,599 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).
Mutton + buttertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,781 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Mutton + red winetop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together117 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).
Mutton + saucetop 25% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,087 recipes

Shared aroma: decanoic acid (soapy, waxy).

Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Fat mutton: The main cut of meat, which is roasted until tender and served sliced.
Red wine: Marinade that adds acidity and flavor, helping to season and tenderize the meat.
Butter: Fat used for basting, adding richness and helping the surface brown while roasting.

“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.