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Leg of Mutton with Oysters

A leg of mutton stuffed with oysters, parsley, onions, herbs, and egg yolks, then boiled.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 25,843 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Leg of Mutton with Oysters

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the stuffing

  1. Parboil the fat oysters.

  2. Mix the oysters with parsley, minced onions, sweet herbs, and the yolks of two hard boiled eggs, all chopped fine.

Stuff and cook

  1. Cut five or six holes in the fleshy part of the leg of mutton.

  2. Stuff the mixture into the holes.

  3. Tie the leg of mutton in a cloth.

  4. Boil gently for 2.5 to 3 hours, depending on the size.

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. Parsley + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

  2. Oyster + eggtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,103 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Oyster + muttontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together317 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Onion + muttontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,531 recipes

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

  5. Oyster + oniontop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,920 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

Fat oysters
Provide the rich, briny flavour that fills the stuffing.
Hard boiled egg yolks
Add a soft, crumbly richness that binds the stuffing together.
Leg of mutton
Forms the main cut of meat that is flavoured by the stuffing as it cooks.

The step that matters

Boil gently for 2.5 to 3 hours. Gentle simmering cooks the thick joint through without toughening the meat, which can happen with a hard boil. Judging by the size of the leg helps set the right time.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (oyster, parsley, egg, mutton):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Cucumberfits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against oyster, parsley, egg, mutton. 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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