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Roast Leg of Lamb

A roasted leg of lamb seasoned with sea salt, served with brown gravy and mint sauce or currant jelly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Lamb and mint work together. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 772 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Roast Leg of Lamb

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Remove the thick skin from the leg of lamb.

  2. Weigh the leg of lamb.

  3. Wipe the meat.

  4. Place the leg on a rack in a roasting pan.

  5. Dredge the leg with flour.

Roast

  1. Put the leg in a 400°F (200°C) oven.

  2. Sear the leg on all sides.

  3. Reduce the heat.

  4. Add 1 cup of boiling water.

  5. Baste the leg every 15 minutes with the liquid in the pan.

  6. Roast for 20 minutes per pound.

  7. Season the meat when it is half cooked.

Serve

  1. Serve with brown gravy and mint sauce or 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. Lamb + minttop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together772 recipes

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

  2. Lamb + flourtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,402 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).

  3. Flour + minttop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Leg of lamb
Is the main cut of meat that provides the flavor and bulk of the dish.
Flour
Dries the surface and helps form a light crust that browns during searing.
Boiling water
Adds moisture to the roasting pan so the drippings stay liquid and can be basted over the meat.

The step that matters

Sear the leg on all sides. Searing at high heat browns the floured surface through the Maillard reaction, building flavor and color before the heat is reduced. Skipping or rushing this step leaves the crust pale and flat.

Swap the mint

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

  1. Jalapenofits better
  2. Turmericfits better
  3. Cuminfits better
  4. Mintthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lamb, flour. 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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