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Lamb, with Okra and Tomatoes

A roasted lamb served with a buttered okra and tomato mixture, glazed tomatoes, cucumber garnish, and a separate gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Okra and tomato work together. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 327 recipes. Both carry damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Lamb, with Okra and Tomatoes

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

Roast and arrange the lamb

  1. Roast the lamb as usual, then cut it into pieces and arrange them on a hot dish.

Prepare the okra and tomatoes

  1. Heat the tin of okra and tomatoes, drain off the excess liquid, and mix with the butter and seasoning.

  2. Place the mixture in the center of the dish.

Garnish and serve

  1. Bake the small tomatoes until glazed and use them to garnish the lamb, resting them on the cucumber.

  2. Make gravy as usual, adding the drained liquid, boil, and serve separately.

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. Okra + tomatotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together327 recipes

    Shared aroma: damascenone (apple, rose).

  2. Tomato + cucumbertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,405 recipes

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

  3. Okra + cucumbertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together36 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Lamb + okratop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29 recipes

    Shared aroma: geraniol (rose, geranium).

  5. Lamb + tomatotop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together979 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans,trans-2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Lamb
Provides the main protein, which browns during roasting and becomes tender when cooked through.
Okra and tomatoes
Adds moisture and a light acidity that balances the rich lamb.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, carrying flavour through the warm vegetables.
Small tomatoes
Browns and softens under heat, adding sweetness and acidity as a garnish.

The step that matters

Draining the okra and tomatoes. Excess liquid left in the tin would make the mixture watery and dilute the butter and seasoning. Draining first keeps it thick, and the saved liquid can go into the gravy instead.

Swap the cucumber

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lamb, okra, tomato, butter):

  1. Eggplantfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Cucumberthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lamb, okra, tomato, 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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