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Braised Leg of Mutton

Braised leg of mutton cooked slowly with bacon, vegetables, gravy, and optional brandy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and garlic match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 29,058 recipes. Both carry furaneol, which smells caramel, strawberry. The science ↓

Braised Leg of Mutton

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Lard the leg of mutton with thick strips of bacon.

  2. In a deep kettle, layer sliced onions, carrots, and turnips. Add salt and pepper to the vegetables.

  3. Place the mutton on top of the vegetables.

Braise

  1. Pour beef gravy and brandy over the mutton.

  2. Cover the pot.

  3. Cook slowly for 4 to 5 hours, turning once.

Finish and serve

  1. Strain the gravy.

  2. Remove fat.

  3. Reduce the gravy to half glaze by boiling without a lid.

  4. Baste the meat with gravy until browned.

  5. Serve on a bed of stewed endive or preferred vegetable.

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. Onion + garlictop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together29,058 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

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

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Onion + turniptop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Pepper + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

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

  5. Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

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 joint of meat that becomes tender during slow, moist cooking.
Bacon
Lardons add fat and savory flavor that melt into the meat as it cooks.
Beef gravy
Provides moisture and savory body that keeps the meat from drying during braising.
Onions
Release sweetness and aroma into the braising liquid as they soften.
Carrots
Add natural sweetness and body to the braising liquid.
Turnips
Contribute mild sweetness and earthy flavor to the braising liquid.

The step that matters

Cook slowly and keep the lid on. Low, covered cooking lets collagen in the tough leg break down into gelatin, making the meat tender and moist. Rushing with high heat or lifting the lid often leaves the meat dry and tough.

Swap the garlic

The recipe marks garlic as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, pepper, beef, brandy, onion, carrot, turnip):

  1. Celeryfits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Thymefits about as well
  4. Garlicthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, pepper, beef, brandy, onion, carrot, turnip. 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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