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Roast Quarter of Lamb

A roasted hind‑quarter lamb seasoned with salt and flour, served with lettuce, peas, and mint sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Peas and mint are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,137 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-ol, which smells mushroom, earthy. The science ↓

Roast Quarter of Lamb

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Remove excess fat from around the kidney of the hind-quarter of lamb.

  2. Skewer the lower joint up to the fillet.

  3. Dredge the lamb with coarse sea salt and flour.

Roast

  1. Place the lamb in a 350°F (175°C) oven and heat it through slowly.

  2. Increase the oven temperature to 400°F (200°C).

  3. Add ½ pint of water to the dripping pan with 1 teaspoon of salt.

  4. Baste the meat occasionally with the liquid.

  5. Roast for about 2 hours.

Serve

  1. Serve with lettuce, green peas, and mint 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.

  1. Peas + minttop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,137 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  2. Lettuce + peastop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,293 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  3. Lettuce + minttop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together569 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Flour + lettucetop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,236 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Lamb
Provides the main meat, whose fat renders and bastes the joint as it roasts.
Flour
Forms a dry coating that helps the outside brown during roasting.
Coarse sea salt
Seasons the surface of the meat and helps draw out moisture for a browned crust.

The step that matters

Basting with the pan liquid. Basting keeps the surface moist and adds flavour while the meat roasts, and the water in the dripping pan helps prevent the drippings from scorching. Opening the oven too often lets heat escape and slows cooking.

Swap the mint

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

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Cuminfits better
  4. Mintthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lamb, flour, lettuce, peas, sauce. 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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