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Mutton, Ragout Of
Slice thinly two turnips, two carrots, and two onions; these last brown in a broad-bottomed stewpan with two ounces of butter or dripping, shaking in a little flour, and stirring to prevent it from browning too quickly. Cut small short chops from a cold roast loin or neck, or from the breast small square pieces, free them from fat, and brown them on each side in the same butter; then pour in as much weak broth or water as may be required, say about half a pint, and add the sliced turnips and carrots, a sprig or two of parsley, and some pepper and salt. Stew very gently until the vegetables are tender. The flavour of this ragout may be varied by the introduction of celery, cut lettuces, or green peas, and these last, when in season, are generally preferred to turnips and carrots. Arrange the meat in a circle, and put the vegetables in the centre, with the sauce over all. Time, three-quarters of an hour. Probable cost, exclusive of meat, 4d. Sufficient, a pound and a half for four persons.
A reheating dish rather than a braise from scratch — the meat is already cooked, so the object is to build a vegetable gravy around it without stewing it to shreds. Everything hinges on keeping the heat very low once the liquid goes in.
- The key instructionCold roast mutton has already been cooked through; simmering it hard will make it dry and stringy. Keep the pan at a bare tremble, and judge the three-quarters of an hour by the turnips and carrots rather than by the meat.
- MeasuresHalf a pint of broth is 10 fl oz in the British Imperial measure this book uses, so a scant 1¼ US cups. Two ounces of butter or dripping is 4 tablespoons.
- "Shaking in a little flour"This is a light roux made on the onions — roughly 1 to 1½ tablespoons for the fat given. The warning against browning too quickly matters: scorched flour tastes bitter and loses thickening power.
- Weak broth"Weak" here means thin or diluted stock rather than a concentrated one. Use a low-sodium stock or dilute what you have, since the recipe is seasoned separately and a concentrated commercial base will overwhelm half a pint of sauce.
- Mutton itselfTrue mutton — older sheep, usually reckoned at over a year or two — is hard to find outside halal and specialist butchers. Leftover roast lamb leg or shoulder behaves much the same way here; breast, as suggested, is fattier and benefits from the instruction to trim.
- VesselA "broad-bottomed stewpan" means a wide, shallow pan: a 10–12 inch sauté pan or shallow casserole. Width lets the meat and vegetables sit in a single layer in the small quantity of liquid.
- The pea variationIf using green peas instead of root vegetables, add them nearer the end rather than at the start; the recipe's own test is to cook until the vegetables are tender, and peas will get there well inside three-quarters of an hour.
- YieldA pound and a half for four, as given, works out at about six ounces a head, though chops from the loin or neck and pieces of breast include bone, so the edible share is less. It will stretch further with bread or potatoes.
Ragout comes from the French ragoûter, to revive the appetite, and by the nineteenth century the word in English cookery had settled into meaning almost any stew of cut meat in a thickened sauce. This is a made dish in the Victorian sense, built from a joint that has already appeared hot at table and then cold, and the fourpence quoted "exclusive of meat" is the whole point — the expensive part is already paid for. Roast mutton was a mainstay of the middle-class English dinner, and a large loin or neck was expected to yield further meals, which is why cookbooks of the period devote so much space to what becomes of yesterday's joint. The arrangement of meat in a ring with vegetables heaped in the centre was a common mode of service, a way of making a reheated dish look composed rather than apologetic.