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Saddle of Mutton

A roasted saddle of mutton seasoned with flour, salt, pepper, served with quince or red currant jelly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and quince work together. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 143 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Saddle of Mutton

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Wash and dry the saddle of mutton.

  2. Dust with flour, coarse sea salt, and black pepper.

Roast and serve

  1. Place in a baking pan in a 400°F (200°C) oven for two hours, basting occasionally.

  2. Serve with quince jelly or red currant jelly.

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. Flour + quincetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together143 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  3. Pepper + quincetop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together60 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptenal (green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Mutton + flourtop 29% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,695 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (grass, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Saddle of mutton
Is the main cut of meat that carries the dish and is roasted through.
Flour
Dusting helps the surface brown and form a crust during roasting.
Quince jelly or red currant jelly
Adds sweet-tart fruitiness that contrasts with the rich, savoury meat.

The step that matters

Basting occasionally during the two-hour roast. Spooning pan juices over the meat keeps the surface moist and helps it brown evenly, while the interior cooks through. Skipping basting can leave the exterior dry.

Swap the quince

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

  1. Limefits better
  2. Lemonfits better
  3. Raisinfits better
  4. Quincethe original

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