Home › The Waldorf Kitchen › Braised Boned Shoulder of Mutton
Braised Boned Shoulder of Mutton
Take out the bone from a shoulder of mutton (see boning), letting the stump remain for a handle. Lard it with strips of fat bacon and sprinkle chopped herbs, salt and pepper over it. Roll it up and sew together with a trussing needle. Place a few slices of bacon at the bottom of a braising pan, put in the shoulder of mutton, add the shoulder bone and a small quantity each of carrots, onions, thyme and laurel leaves, two heads of celery and a little stock. Cover with slices of bacon and then with paper, place over a slow fire and simmer gently until done. Place on a dish, remove the string, and serve with a garnish of glazed onions.
A classic French braise written for a cook who already knew how to bone a shoulder and read a fire. The gaps are mostly quantities, temperature and one cut of meat that has largely left the market.
- Mutton vs. lambMutton is sheep past its first or second year — stronger-flavoured and tougher than lamb, and rarely sold in American supermarkets. A boneless lamb shoulder of 4 to 5 lb behaves the same way in a braise but will be tender sooner; halal and ethnic butchers are the likeliest source of true mutton.
- The hinge: keep it barely simmering"Simmer gently until done" is the whole recipe. Shoulder is collagen-rich and needs long moist heat below the boil; a rolling braise squeezes the muscle fibers and gives you dry meat in wet sauce. Hold the liquid at a lazy bubble.
- Slow fire, in numbersThe recipe cooks over a "slow fire" and names no oven; the modern equivalent is a heavy covered pot on the lowest burner, or an oven set around 300–325F. Figure roughly 3 to 3½ hours for lamb shoulder and longer for mutton; it is done when a skewer slides through the thickest part with no resistance.
- LardingLarding means threading strips of fatback or fat bacon through the meat with a larding needle. Modern cooks who lack one can simply lay the bacon strips over the surface of the meat before rolling, which serves nearly as well since the roll is enclosed.
- Laurel and "heads of celery"Laurel leaves are bay leaves — one or two, not a handful. A head of celery is a whole bunch, so two heads is a great deal; one bunch, trimmed and cut in lengths, is plenty for a 5 lb roll.
- "A little stock" and the paperThe recipe asks only for "a little stock" — enough to come partway up the meat; this is a braise, not a poach. The paper laid over the bacon works like a cartouche, keeping the exposed top moist and holding in the steam.
- TrussingSew or tie with cotton butcher's twine at 1-inch intervals so the roll holds its shape while the connective tissue softens. Leave the shoulder bone in the pot as instructed — it contributes gelatin and body to the liquid.
- Finishing the liquidThe recipe stops at the garnish, but the braising liquid is the sauce. Strain it, skim the fat, and reduce hard until it coats a spoon; the bacon and bone will have given it enough body to gloss without thickening.
- YieldA boned 4 to 5 lb shoulder serves 6 to 8. Glazed onions means small onions simmered in stock with butter and a pinch of sugar until the liquid reduces to a syrup.
Oscar Tschirky's book records the working repertoire of a large hotel kitchen at the turn of the twentieth century, and that repertoire was essentially French — this dish is a braised mutton shoulder in an American cookbook's clothing, down to the laurel leaves and the bacon-lined pan. Boning, rolling and tying a shoulder solved a practical problem: it made an awkward, sinewy, cheap cut carve into neat rounds at the table, which mattered in a house where presentation was half the sale. Mutton itself was once ordinary eating and lingered on American menus well into the twentieth century; its gradual near-disappearance since, in favor of young lamb, is why this cut now reads as exotic. The instruction to cover the meat with paper under the lid is the older form of a technique French kitchens still use, and it is a reminder that these recipes were written for cooks who owned braising pans with recessed lids and coals, not thermostats.