MUTTON AND LAMB
Mutton is the meat of sheep and is almost as nutritious as beef.
Lamb is the meat from a lamb. It is less nutritious than mutton. Spring lamb is the meat from a lamb at 6 or 8 weeks.
ROAST LAMB
A leg of lamb is usually sent from market surrounded by a thin membrane known as the caul. If this peels off easily and the fat is hard, white and flaky, the meat is in good condition. Remove the caul, wipe meat with wet cloth, sprinkle with salt and pepper, place in hot roasting pan, dredge the meat and pan with flour, place in a hot oven. Baste with water and drippings as soon as flour in pan browns, and every 15 min afterward until meat is done. The heat in oven should be reduced after the first 30 min of roasting. It will take about 2 hr for roasting.
Good quality mutton should be fine grained and of bright pink color; the fat white, hard and flaky. Lamb chops may be easily distinguished from mutton chops by the red color of bone. As a lamb grows older blood recedes from bones; therefore in mutton the bone is white. Good mutton contains a larger proportion of fat than good beef. Poor mutton is often told by the relatively small proportion of fat and lean as compared to bone.
Lamb is usually preferred well done. Mutton is often cooked rare.
To Carve a Leg of Lamb. Cut in thin slices across grain of meat to the bone, beginning at top of the leg.
HOT POT OF MUTTON
1 lb mutton, ½ c pearl barley, celery tops or parsley, 4 potatoes, 3 onions, 1 tbp salt.
Cut mutton in small pieces and brown with onion fat cut from the meat; pour this into a covered saucepan; add 2 qt water and the barley; simmer for 1½ hr; then add the potatoes, cut in quarters, add the seasonings and cook ½ hr longer.
BALLOTIN OF LAMB
Bone a shoulder of lamb, leaving the end for a handle; sew it up with a needle, tie it firmly and boil for 5 min; take out and cool, then lard it; put a slice of bacon in a saucepan with 1 tbp minced onion and 1 carrot; brown the lamb with these for 5 min; remove meat to a kettle and add a pt of white broth and seasoning, and cook for 1¼ hr. The sauce should reduce ½; thicken slightly, pour it over 1 pt boiled green peas and lay the lamb upon them.
BREADED MUTTON CHOPS
Wipe and trim chops, sprinkle with salt and pepper; dip in crumbs, egg and crumbs; fry in deep fat from 5 to 8 min; drain; serve with tomato sauce, or stack around a mound of mashed potatoes, fried potato balls or green peas; allow fat to reheat between fryings; after testing fat for temperature, put in chops and place kettle on back of range, that surface of chops may not be too brown while the inside is still underdone.
BRAISED BREAST OF LAMB
With sharp knife remove bones from a breast of lamb; season it well with salt and pepper; roll up and tie firmly with twine; put 2 tbp butter in the braising pan, and when melted add 1 onion, 1 slice of carrot and 1 of turnip, all cut fine; stir for 5 min and then put in the lamb, with a thick dredging of flour; cover and set back where it will cook slowly for an hour; baste often; take up the meat, skim all the fat off the gravy, put it where it will boil rapidly for 5 min; take the string from the meat; strain the gravy and pour over the dish; serve very hot with tomato sauce. Bones put in the pan with the meat improve the gravy.
BROILED CHOPS
Wipe chops, remove superfluous fat, and place in a broiler greased with some of mutton fat. In loin chops, flank may be rolled and fastened with a small wooden skewer.
PAN BROILED CHOPS
Chops for pan broiling should have flank and most of fat removed; wipe chops and put in frying pan rubbed with a piece of fat cut from chops; sear under surface, turn and sear other side; turn often, using knife and fork that the surface may not be pierced, as would be liable if fork alone were used; cook to suit; let stand around edge of frying pan to brown the outside fat; when half cooked, sprinkle with salt; put on hot platter, and spread with butter or serve with tomato sauce.
Gravy. Drain off all but 3 tbp of fat from the dripping pan; dredge into it 3 tbp flour, and brown well; add 1 pt cold water; cook slowly, stirring constantly until thick and smooth. If made carefully, this will require no straining.
SADDLE OF MUTTON
The loin is removed whole before dividing into sides; trim meat, wipe with wet cloth, sprinkle with salt and pepper; place on rack in hot roaster; dredge meat and bottom of pan with flour; place in hot oven; baste with water and fat as soon as flour browns and every 15 min afterward. The meat should cook in 1¼ hr.
ROAST MUTTON SHOULDER
Remove the bone and fill space with a moist stuffing made with grated stale bread crumbs, highly seasoned with butter, salt, pepper and thyme; add the yolk of 1 or 2 eggs and enough warm water to soften the bread; put bones and scraps of meat in a kettle with barely enough water to cover; lay the stuffed shoulder on them and let the whole simmer gently for 1 hr; lift onto the rack in a roasting pan; dredge with salt, pepper and flour and bake an hour, or till tender; strain the water in the kettle and use it for basting and for gravy, with a little butter and flour at the last to froth the surface.
MINCED LAMB
Remove dry pieces of skin and gristle from left-over cold roast lamb and chop the meat; heat in well-buttered frying pan; season with salt, pepper and celery salt; dredge well with flour and add enough hot water to make a thin gravy; pour on slices of buttered toast.
SALMI OF LAMB
Cut cold roast lamb in thin slices; cook 5 min 2 tbp butter with ½ tbp finely chopped onion; add lamb; sprinkle with salt and pepper, and cover with 1 c brown sauce; cook until thoroughly heated; arrange slices overlapping one another lengthwise of platter; pour around sauce, and garnish with toast points. A few sliced mushrooms or stoned olives improve this sauce.
FRICASSEE OF LAMB
3 lb lamb from the forequarter, cut in pieces for serving; wipe meat; put in kettle; cover with boiling water, and cook slowly until meat is tender; remove from water, cool, sprinkle with salt and pepper; dredge with flour, and saute in butter or mutton fat; arrange on platter and pour around 1½ c brown sauce made from liquid in which meat was cooked after removing all fat.
SCALLOPED LAMB
Remove skin and fat from thin slices of cold roast lamb, and sprinkle with salt and pepper; cover bottom of a buttered baking dish with buttered cracker crumbs; cover crumbs with meat; cover meat with boiled macaroni, and add another layer of meat and macaroni; pour over tomato sauce, and cover with buttered cracker crumbs; bake in hot oven until crumbs are brown. Cold rice may be used in place of macaroni.
LAMB EN CASSEROLE
3 c cold cooked lamb, cut in pieces, 1 tbp butter, 1 c cooked carrots, cut in cubes, 1 c cooked potato balls, 8 small onions, cooked, left-over gravy.
Brown lamb in fat; put in a baking dish; add carrots, potato balls and onions; add left-over gravy and enough hot water to moisten; season with salt and pepper; cover and bake in hot oven 20 to 25 min.
SCALLOPED LAMB
2 c cooked lamb, cut in small pieces, 2 c medium white sauce, 1 c soft bread crumbs, 1 tbp chopped parsley.
Mix lamb and white sauce together; put a layer of lamb in a greased casserole or baking dish; add a layer of bread crumbs and sprinkle with parsley; repeat this process until all the ingredients are used, having a layer of crumbs on top; bake in a hot oven 20 to 25 min, or until crumbs are brown.
CURRIED LAMB
2½ lb lamb shoulder, 2 tbp fat, 1 tsp salt, ⅛ tsp pepper, 1½ tbp curry powder, 2 tbp flour, 2 tbp water, 3 c boiled rice.
Wipe lamb with a clean, damp cloth; cut into medium-sized pieces and remove the fat; melt butter in a frying pan; add lamb and cook until delicate brown; cover with boiling water; add salt, pepper and curry powder mixed with a little cold water; cover and simmer for about 2½ hr or until lamb is tender; make a smooth paste of the flour and water and add enough to thicken the liquid; mound hot rice in center of a hot platter and pour the curried lamb around it.