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Hashed Mutton, with Hard Dumplings

A hash of cooked mutton with buttered onions, topped with batter dumplings that cook until fluffy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Hashed Mutton, with Hard Dumplings

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare the hash

  1. In a skillet, melt butter and sauté onion until soft.

  2. Add chopped mutton, season with salt and pepper, and heat through.

Make and cook the dumplings

  1. In a bowl, mix flour, baking powder, and salt.

  2. Stir in milk and egg until smooth.

  3. Drop spoonfuls of the batter onto the mutton mixture.

  4. Cover and cook for 20 minutes until dumplings are fluffy.

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 + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  3. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Butter + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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
Provides the cooked meat base that makes up most of the hash.
All-purpose flour
Forms the structure of the dumplings as it sets during cooking.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter so the dumplings rise and turn light.
Egg
Adds structure and richness to the batter, helping it hold together while cooking.
Milk
Moistens the flour to form a batter and adds tenderness to the dumplings.
Onion
Softens and adds sweetness and savoury depth to the hash base.

The step that matters

Cover and cook the dumplings for 20 minutes. Keeping the lid on traps steam that cooks the dumpling tops through and makes them fluffy. Lifting the lid lets steam escape, so the dumplings can turn dense or stay raw in the centre.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, butter, pepper, flour, milk, egg):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, butter, pepper, flour, milk, egg. 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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