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Mutton, Saddle of, Roasted
A saddle of mutton, if hung in a cool airy place, will improve with keeping from one to three weeks, according to the weather; but as this part of the sheep is the most tender and delicate, it may, if liked, be roasted in from four to five days. If not for a large family, get the joint well trimmed; the flaps, tail, and chump end may be cut away, which will considerably lessen the weight, and be found more advantageous to the purchaser, even at a higher price per pound. In its entire state it is considered an expensive joint, consequently people of moderate means and family, unless so accommodated by the butcher, can seldom order it. Roast as before directed for roast loin (see MUTTON, LOIN OF, ROASTED). The joint should be skinned, and the skin tied over it securely until within half an hour of its being sent to table, when it should be removed, and the surface browned and frothed. It should be of a pale brown colour. Make a gravy in the dripping-pan: do not pour it over the meat, but put a little in the dish, and more in a tureen, with red currant jelly or port-wine sauce. Time, ten pounds, two hours and a half, or less if liked underdone. Probable cost, 10d. per pound. Sufficient for seven or eight persons.
A saddle is the whole unsplit loin, both sides of the backbone from the last rib to the hip — the grandest of the mutton roasts and still cut by any butcher who will take the order. Cassell's assumes you know how the loin was roasted a page earlier, so the working detail is thin.
- Do not hang it yourselfThe instruction to hang the joint one to three weeks in "a cool airy place" belongs to a world of cold larders, hanging safes and no central heating. Dry-ageing is now done by the butcher at a controlled 34-38F with regulated airflow; a domestic kitchen or garage cannot hold those conditions. Buy the meat already aged and roast it within a day or two.
- Mutton, not lambMutton means sheep over two years old — darker, firmer, far stronger in flavour, and rarely stocked outside halal butchers and specialist farms. A saddle of lamb will behave similarly but cooks faster and tastes much milder; if you want what the book intends, ask specifically for mutton or hogget.
- Oven temperatureThe book gives none because it means a spit or a range fire. Start at 425F for the first 20-25 minutes to set the surface, then drop to 350F for the remainder.
- Time versus thermometerTwo and a half hours for ten pounds works out at roughly fifteen minutes a pound, which will bring a saddle well past pink. Cook to internal temperature instead: about 130-135F at the thickest part of the loin for medium-rare, 145F for medium, taken away from the bone.
- The skin, or fellThe papery membrane over the fat is the fell. Cassell's has you peel it off, tie it back over the joint as a self-basting jacket, then remove it for the last half hour so the fat can colour. It works, though a simple foil tent removed for the final 30 minutes achieves the same thing with less string.
- FrothingTo froth is to dust the surface with flour, baste with hot dripping and return it briefly to fierce heat, raising a light crisp blistered crust. Cassell's pairs it with browning -- the surface is 'browned and frothed' -- and sets the target colour as pale brown rather than deep.
- Gravy in the dripping-panPour off most of the fat, loosen the sediment with stock and a splash of the port if you are making port-wine sauce, and season. Kept off the meat, as instructed, so the crust stays crisp.
- Resting and carvingRest 20-30 minutes under loose foil. A saddle is carved in long strips parallel to the backbone, lifted from the bone in slices the length of the loin — quite unlike carving a leg.
- Yield and costSeven or eight persons is what the book claims, and the timing is given for a ten-pound joint; note that the book's trimming advice would bring the weight down from that. The tenpence a pound is Victorian pricing and tells you only that this was a joint for households with money; the butcher's quote today will be the deciding factor.
The saddle was the ceremonial joint of the Victorian dinner table -- big enough to carve in front of company, expensive enough to signal that you could afford it, and awkward enough that Cassell's gives several sentences to how a smaller household might get one trimmed down to a manageable size. That practical note is the real period detail: the book reckons the purchaser better off having the flaps, tail and chump end cut away, since the lighter joint is more advantageous even at a higher price per pound. Mutton, not lamb, was the default sheep meat in nineteenth-century Britain; lamb was a spring luxury, while mutton fed the country year-round and was valued for exactly the strong flavour that later drove it out of fashion. The red currant jelly alongside is older than the book and still standard with sheep and game, the sharp-sweet fruit cutting mutton fat in the same way apple sauce is set against pork.