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Roast Leg of Mutton

A roasted leg of mutton seasoned with salt, optionally with garlic, served with a broth-based gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and garlic are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,368 recipes. Both carry linalool, which smells floral, citrus. The science ↓

Roast Leg of Mutton

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Keep the mutton in a dry, airy place for a few days before roasting.

  2. Saw off the shank-bone two inches below the knuckle.

  3. If desired, insert a clove of garlic near the knuckle.

Roast

  1. Roast the mutton before a sharp fire for 15 minutes to seal in the juices.

  2. Move the mutton a short distance from the fire to finish roasting.

  3. Add ½ pint of broth to the dripping pan.

  4. Sprinkle the mutton with salt 5 to 10 minutes before removing from the fire.

Serve

  1. Place the mutton on a dish and add a paper frill around the knuckle-bone.

  2. Skim off excess fat and strain the gravy over the meat.

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. Clove + garlictop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,368 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

  2. Mutton + garlictop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together673 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-ethyl-2,5-dimethylpyrazine (roasted, nutty).

  3. Mutton + clovetop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,152 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

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 body of the roast, providing the meat that is cooked and served.
Broth
Adds moisture to the dripping pan, which becomes the base for the gravy.
Garlic
Adds aroma to the meat as it roasts near the knuckle.

The step that matters

Roast before a sharp fire for 15 minutes. A hot initial sear helps brown the surface and seal in juices, and then moving the meat away from the fire lets the interior cook through without burning the outside.

Swap the clove

The recipe marks clove as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, garlic):

  1. Cuminfits better
  2. Pepperfits better
  3. Parsleyfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, garlic. 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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