Name: Casserole of Roast Mutton
Ingredients: Cold leg of mutton, sliced; Flour, for sprinkling; Cayenne pepper, to taste; Coarse sea salt, to taste; ½ cup melted butter; Mashed potatoes, prepared with cream and mace

Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Casserole of Roast Mutton

Ingredients

Cold leg of mutton, sliced
Flour, for sprinkling
Cayenne pepper, to taste
Coarse sea salt, to taste
½ cup melted butter
Mashed potatoes, prepared with cream and mace

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

Slice the cold leg of mutton, removing excess fat.
Sprinkle the slices lightly with flour, cayenne, and salt.

Assemble

Pour melted butter into a pudding mold, coating the sides.
Line the mold with mashed potatoes, about ½ inch thick.
Fill the mold with mutton slices and top with another layer of mashed potatoes.

Bake and serve

Cover the mold with writing paper and bake at 350°F (175°C) for 1 hour.
Turn out the casserole and serve with gravy around it.

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 + creamtop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,516 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Pepper + potatotop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,305 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Butter + potatotop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together6,456 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Flour + potatotop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,355 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter 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

Cold leg of mutton: Forms the main body of the casserole and carries its meaty flavor.
Melted butter: Coats the mold and adds richness and fat to the dish.
Mashed potatoes: Form the layers that hold the meat and add moisture and soft texture.
Flour: Lightly coats the meat, helping it brown and thicken its surface juices.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, flour, pepper, butter, potato, cream):

Nutmegfits better
Parsleyfits better
Turmericfits better
Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, flour, pepper, butter, potato, cream. 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.