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Mint Sauce with Oil
Chop fine one bunch of choice mint; mix with a tablespoonful of white sugar, a pinch of salt and pepper each, six tablespoonfuls of strong vinegar with half a teaspoonful of olive oil. Stir well and serve with roast lamb, veal or pork.
An uncooked mint sauce in the English style, thinner and sharper than a modern mint jelly. Nothing here needs updating except the balance of vinegar, which is aggressive by current taste.
- The vinegar is the hingeSix tablespoons of "strong vinegar" against one tablespoon of sugar gives a very acid sauce. Start with three tablespoons of white wine or cider vinegar, taste, and add more; a spoonful of hot water softens the edge without diluting the mint.
- One bunch of mintTake that as roughly a cup or so of loosely packed leaves, stems discarded. Spearmint is the traditional choice; peppermint is too cooling and medicinal for a meat sauce.
- Chop, do not blendA food processor bruises mint and turns the sauce dark and slightly bitter. Chop by hand with a sharp knife, or pound the leaves with the sugar in a mortar, which draws out the oils and dissolves the sugar at the same time.
- White sugarGranulated is fine. Caster or superfine dissolves faster in cold vinegar, which matters since the sauce is never heated.
- Half a teaspoon of oilThat is a token amount, meant to round the acidity rather than emulsify. It will separate; stir again before serving and accept that this is a loose sauce, not a dressing.
- Rest before servingGive it 30 minutes at room temperature so the mint infuses the vinegar. Made much further ahead the leaves go drab, so mix it the same day.
- YieldAbout half a cup, enough for four to six servings alongside roast lamb. Serve at room temperature in a small pitcher or boat, spooned over the meat at the table.
Mint with lamb is a long-standing English pairing, and vinegar-based mint sauce of this type — chopped mint, sugar, vinegar — was common on British tables through the nineteenth century and passed into American books largely unchanged. The half teaspoonful of olive oil is the unusual element here, and the note that it suits veal and pork as well as lamb suggests it was meant to do general duty against a rich roast.