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Haricot Mutton

A slow‑cooked mutton stew thickened with flour and flavored with ketchup and liquid browning.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Haricot Mutton

Why it works: Flour and ketchup are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,435 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Haricot Mutton

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the mutton

  1. Cook the mutton for two hours, skimming off the scum as it rises.

  2. Remove the herbs from the pot.

Thicken and season

  1. Mix the flour with cold water to form a smooth paste.

  2. Add a little of the boiling liquid to the paste, then stir it into the soup.

  3. Let it boil for one to two minutes.

  4. Add the ketchup, liquid browning for color, and a little pepper.

  5. Boil once more and serve very hot.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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 + ketchuptop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,435 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Mutton + ketchuptop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together367 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanoic acid (soapy, waxy).

  5. Ketchup + peppertop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,207 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Mutton
Provides the main meat and rich, savory flavor as it simmers into the broth.
Flour
Thickens the liquid into a smooth, body-rich stew when mixed with water and boiled.
Ketchup
Adds a sweet and tangy note that rounds out the savory broth.
Liquid browning
Darkens the color of the stew without changing its main flavor.

The step that matters

Stirring the flour paste into the boiling liquid. Flour lumps if added dry or to hot liquid without being smoothed into cold water first. Starch granules swell and thicken only when heated in liquid, so a smooth paste dispersed evenly gives a lump-free, even thickness.

“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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