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Mutton Cutlets with Potatoes

Mutton cutlets coated in breadcrumbs and fried, served with potatoes and a reduced sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Mutton Cutlets with Potatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mutton

  1. Cut the loin of mutton into steaks and beat them with a chopper.

  2. Trim the steaks neatly and season with sweet herbs, minced shallots, pepper, salt, and lemon juice.

  3. Cook the steaks until nearly done, then let them cool on a dish.

Fry and plate

  1. Dip the cooled steaks in egg, coat with breadcrumbs, and fry in boiling lard until light brown.

  2. Arrange the steaks around a dish, leaving a cavity in the center for the potatoes.

  3. Peel and shape the potatoes, then fry them until lightly colored and keep warm.

  4. Add a little cullis and catchup to the sauce from the steaks, strain, and reduce it to a glaze.

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. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

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

  2. Shallot + lemontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,523 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Shallot + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together272 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Pepper + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  5. Shallot + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,898 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Loin of mutton
Forms the main body of the dish; beating and cooking it sets the meat into tender steaks.
Egg
Binds the breadcrumb coating so it adheres to the steaks during frying.
Breadcrumbs
Form a crisp, browned crust when fried in lard.
Shallots
Add a mild, aromatic onion flavour to the seasoning on the steaks.
Potatoes
Provide a starchy side that fries to a golden exterior while staying soft inside.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the seasoning and cuts the richness of the meat.

The step that matters

Frying the breaded steaks in boiling lard. The steaks are already cooked, so frying is only for colour and crust. If the lard is not hot enough, the breadcrumbs absorb fat and turn greasy, while too much heat can brown the coating before it is heated through.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, shallot, pepper, lemon, egg, sauce):

  1. Spinachfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Potatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, shallot, pepper, lemon, egg, sauce. 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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