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Leg of Lamb, Roasted, Bordeaux Fashion

Roasted leg of lamb seasoned with butter or lard, salt, bread crumbs, parsley, served with gravy and fresh mint.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and mint are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,198 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Leg of Lamb, Roasted, Bordeaux Fashion

Ingredients

Directions

Roast

  1. Set the leg of lamb on a spit.

  2. Moisten the lamb with butter or lard.

  3. Roast the lamb on a brisk fire, basting frequently with drippings.

  4. Salt the lamb.

  5. Sprinkle the lamb with bread crumbs mixed with chopped parsley.

  6. Roast the lamb for 4-5 minutes longer.

  7. Remove the lamb from the fire and dish it up.

Serve

  1. Serve the lamb separately with a sauceboat of gravy.

  2. Add some shredded fresh mint to the gravy.

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. Parsley + minttop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,198 recipes

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

  2. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Lamb + parsleytop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,322 recipes

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

  4. Lamb + minttop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together772 recipes

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

  5. Lamb + breadtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together598 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Leg of lamb
Forms the main roast, cooked over direct heat until tender and browned.
Butter or lard
Adds fat that moistens the surface and helps it brown during roasting.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, browned crust on the outside of the lamb.
Gravy
Adds moisture and savoury richness to the sliced meat when served.

The step that matters

Roast the lamb for 4-5 minutes longer. Lamb is best when cooked gently to the right doneness; a short final roast after the crust forms can easily tip it from pink to overcooked. Checking the meat's internal temperature helps avoid dryness.

Swap the mint

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lamb, butter, bread, parsley):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Garlicfits better
  4. Mintthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lamb, butter, bread, parsley. 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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