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Rolled Loin of Mutton
402. Bone a loin of mutton, stuff it with veal stuffing. Roll it round, roast it, and serve with gravy and sweet sauce. STEWED FILLET OF MUTTON (AMERICAN). 403. Cut a fillet from a leg of mutton, remove the fat from the outside, and take out the bone. Beat it well with a rolling-pin, and rub , and take out the bone. Beat it well with a rolling-pin, and rub it with pepper and salt; fill the place of the bone with a stuffing of firmly mixed onions, bread crumbs, butter, salt, pepper, and nutmeg, well mixed.
Make deep cuts all over the surface of the meat, and fill them with the stuffing. Bind a tape round the meat, put it in a stewpan with sufficient water to cover it, and let it stew slowly four, five, or six hours according to its size, skimming frequently. Serve with its own gravy. A thick round of fresh beef is very good stuffed and stewed in the same manner ; it will take longer stewing than the mutton.
Two closely related mutton dishes: a boned loin rolled around stuffing and roasted, and a boned leg fillet stuffed and long-stewed. Both assume mutton, which is stronger and tougher than the lamb sold today, and both assume a cook who can bone a joint or knows a butcher who will.
- Get the butcher to bone itA loin boned and left in one flat sheet is what you want for rolling; a leg fillet is the thick centre cut off the leg with the bone removed. Ask for it butterflied rather than tunnel-boned so you have a surface to spread stuffing on.
- Veal stuffingIn this period that means a veal forcemeat: minced veal or veal suet with breadcrumbs, chopped herbs, lemon peel, mace and egg to bind. Any well-seasoned bread-and-herb stuffing does the same job if veal is hard to find.
- Sweet sauceWith roast mutton this most often means redcurrant jelly, or a thin sweet-sour sauce of currant jelly loosened with a little of the pan gravy. The recipe does not specify, but it is not a dessert sauce.
- Roasting the rolled loinTie at 1-inch intervals, roast at 425F for 20 minutes to set the outside, then drop to 350F. Because the joint is stuffed with a raw meat forcemeat, take it to 165F at the centre of the stuffing rather than cooking by the clock; a 3 lb rolled loin runs roughly 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 hours in total.
- Tape means stringCotton tape was used to hold a stuffed joint together in the pot. Plain butcher's twine is the modern equivalent; do not use anything with a synthetic content.
- The stewing time is longFour to six hours suited old mutton from a mature sheep. Modern lamb leg will be dry and stringy well before that. Simmer a stuffed 3-4 lb fillet at a bare 180-190F for 2 to 2 1/2 hours, and stop when a skewer meets no resistance.
- Skim, and never let it boilThe instruction to skim frequently is the hinge of the stewed version. A rolling boil clouds the liquid and shreds the stuffing out of the cuts; a bare shiver at the surface keeps the gravy clear enough to serve as written, with no thickening.
- The beef variantA thick round of beef, stuffed and stewed the same way, is a pot roast in all but name. Expect 3 to 4 hours at the same low simmer for a 4 lb piece.
- YieldEither joint, at 3-4 lb boned weight, serves six to eight with vegetables.