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Baked and Stuffed

A baked mutton shoulder stuffed with veal forcemeat, served with a brown sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Baked and Stuffed

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the meat

  1. Remove all bones from the shoulder and boil them down to make stock.

  2. Flatten the meat using a wetted rolling pin.

  3. Season the meat well with salt and pepper, spread it over the forcemeat, roll tightly, and bind securely with string.

Roast

  1. Melt the dripping in a baking tin, baste the meat well, and place it in a 350°F (175°C) oven.

  2. Cook gently for about 1.5 hours, basting frequently.

  3. Meanwhile, fry the butter and flour together until a brown roux forms.

  4. Strain the roux into ½ pint of stock made from the boiled bones, stir until it boils, and season to taste.

  5. After 1.5 hours, drain off all fat but leave the sediment in the tin, pour in the brown sauce, and return to the oven.

  6. Cook for an additional 30 minutes, basting frequently.

Serve

  1. Serve on a hot dish, pouring a little sauce over the meat and serving the rest 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. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Mutton + vealtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,394 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-nonanal (fatty, waxy).

  3. Mutton + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,442 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Mutton + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,781 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Flour + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Mutton shoulder
Forms the main body of the dish, becoming tender and juicy during slow cooking.
Veal forcemeat
Fills the rolled meat, adding moisture and a soft, savoury texture as it cooks.
Butter
Fat that cooks with the flour to form a roux, giving the sauce body and a brown colour.
Flour
Thickens the stock into a sauce when cooked with butter into a roux.
Dripping
Fat used to coat the tin and meat, promoting browning and preventing sticking.

The step that matters

Draining the fat before adding the sauce. Leaving the fat in the tin keeps the sauce greasy, while leaving the sediment preserves browned flavour. Draining only the fat keeps the sauce clean and rich.

“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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