Name: Breaded Lamb Chops
Ingredients: 2 French lamb chops; 2 tablespoons butter or dripping; 4 tablespoons flour; 1 teaspoon salt; ¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper; 1 cup milk; ⅓ cup chopped ham; breadcrumbs

Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Breaded Lamb Chops

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

Make a thick white sauce by melting butter, adding flour, and gradually whisking in milk.
Season the sauce with salt and cayenne pepper.
Stir in chopped ham and let the mixture cool.

Prepare the chops

Trim excess fat from the lamb chops.
Broil or pan-broil the lamb chops until cooked.
Season the lamb chops and let them cool.
Cover the lamb chops with a layer of the sauce.

Coat and fry

Dip the lamb chops in beaten egg.
Coat the lamb chops with breadcrumbs.
Fry the lamb chops in deep fat at 370°F (188°C) until golden brown, about 60 seconds.

Finish and serve

Cover the ends of the bones with paper frills.
Garnish the lamb chops with parsley and potato roses.
Serve the lamb chops with Tomato or Cuban Sauce.

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.

Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Lamb + peppertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,165 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together78,219 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Lamb + hamtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together160 recipes

Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Lamb chops: Forms the main body of the dish, cooked first and then coated and fried.
Flour: Thickens the butter and milk into a sauce that holds together and coats the chops.
Butter: Adds richness and flavour to the sauce and helps the flour form a smooth roux.
Milk: Forms the liquid base of the white sauce, giving it a creamy, smooth texture.
Chopped ham: Adds savoury flavour and salty depth to the sauce layer.
Breadcrumbs: Form a crisp outer crust that browns when fried.

The step that matters

Frying in deep fat at 370°F. At this temperature the breadcrumb coating browns quickly and crisps before it can soak up much oil. Cooler fat lets the coating absorb grease and turn soggy, while the short frying time means the coating must be hot enough to brown fast.

“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.