Hello Again Maryam, very much liked this piece on mutton in general and aloo ghost specifically
When I was quite young I grew up on a biggish sheep station in Central Queensland. It was about 120 sq miles or in todays terms, 320 sq kilometres and raised about 24000 sheep each tear as well as cattle, horses (for riding) and a lot of poultry.
Quite a harsh climate in summer, like into mid 40 C often.
So we usually ate mutton as a red meat mostly. Cattle were just worth too much and butchery more awkward. Didn't eat lamb as they were future product, as we were wool producers in the main.
My grandfather's often repeated joke was," I have a nice surprise for you, it's not mutton tonight...it's hogget !" A sheep a year younger (ie between 12 -24 months old).
So agree that it is a very versatile meat as long as cooked properly.
Sadly fresh mutton not so widely sold now, but I suspect a lot of supermarket lamb is indeed hogget.
I continued visit and work with my grandfather most summer and winter breaks till into my early 20s. Among many jobs I had was aging sheep when we draftiing them. This was done by counting the number of lower jaw incisor teeth they had ! to or only milk teeth wer lamb, 4 were hogget and 6 were mutton. A tireless job as often a focf over 1000 to do and the sheep werr often cranky.
So as i grew up a lot of mutton in various cuts and means, and we ate a lot of the offal. We did have occasional wild (feral) goat but not a huge amount as not huge in numbers but also quite canny and elusive. They caused a lot of damage to native trees as they would strip their bark of in drier periods and kill them.
Thank you for the curries to consider and totally love turnips ! And swedes, and sweet potato....
And last thanks a lot for the Aloo Gosht (spell check may have altered previous) recipe. This takes me back to 1985 and was my first attempt at any cooking from the "subcontinent" From the Australian Womens Weekly Indian Cookbook It turned out well but a bit tricky as no second pot to do the rice, and had doubled the quantity as a big dinner. Kucky our landlords lived down the street and were happy to lend us some extra cooking gear1. Did have a mortar and pestle ( a 21st birthday present) so able to
do fresh ground spices. A fond cooking memory and think my grandfather would have liked.
He taught me most of the basics of cooking.
One of his fav stews was slow cooked neck stew and shannf. Many people then fed this too their dogs.
And,`` for your red meat eating lover mother, his fav roast mutton was a cut called the Saddle (Google) if you are not aware. A cut that you never see in butcheries and young butchers often don't know. It can be quite big in mutton. like 3 kg. Even though from mutton, it is usually a lot nore tender as the loin is not such an active muscle group. Was once a mainstay of roast meat in swank hotels especially for Sunday lunch.
A lot of debate about how to carve ie parallel to the bone or transversely from the skin side to the bone. The latter by far the better in my view, and same goes for the leg. It looks better and you are cutting through the meat fibres at sort of 90 degrees, and I think less wastage. And like
all roast meat and grilled meat, it must stand for a while, and longer if a big piece. If you cut too early, the internal temp will drop and the meat won't have set correctly.
Let me know if you ever give it a go !
Love your blogs and the narrative and meaning and explanation has such a nice appeal of
Thank you so much. I was never aware of saddle but it sounds spectacular! It will be tough to procure but let me see if there are higher end restaurants in the city where I can find it. Thanks so much for following along.
Hi Maryam. It is certainly hard to find a butcher here who has even heard of the cut now, or one who feels adventurous, though in reality if they are truly butchering, they would be cutting loin of lamb all the time. But a lot of meat is not cut from whole carcases in shops now.
it is called saddle because if it were a horse it is where the saddle would sit. It can be done , I think with the bone (spine in or out, and rolled. It can be a large piece of meat if mutton, but should for example fit in a Weber kettle.
And pretty sure that goat can be done as well
We had a very large Aga stove, which had I think 8 different sized round heating points and one central very big one, with three different sized ovens. It was massively heavy, as solid cast iron and enamel and chrome steel
V old school and “dual fuel”, which meant timber or charcoal, which was best (we made our own for a long time. Quite clever design and had thre four fire boxes. Three for the stove tops and ovens (so you didn’t have to fire up if only needing fewer hot points or ovens, and one for a hot ware system for the kitchen.
Did come across some stuff on line, but leant more talking to my 92 yr old mum who has cooked a saddle or two and used this monster in the 1950s.
Refused to start it up, as that is defiitely a man’s job.
Hello Again Maryam, very much liked this piece on mutton in general and aloo ghost specifically
When I was quite young I grew up on a biggish sheep station in Central Queensland. It was about 120 sq miles or in todays terms, 320 sq kilometres and raised about 24000 sheep each tear as well as cattle, horses (for riding) and a lot of poultry.
Quite a harsh climate in summer, like into mid 40 C often.
So we usually ate mutton as a red meat mostly. Cattle were just worth too much and butchery more awkward. Didn't eat lamb as they were future product, as we were wool producers in the main.
My grandfather's often repeated joke was," I have a nice surprise for you, it's not mutton tonight...it's hogget !" A sheep a year younger (ie between 12 -24 months old).
So agree that it is a very versatile meat as long as cooked properly.
Sadly fresh mutton not so widely sold now, but I suspect a lot of supermarket lamb is indeed hogget.
I continued visit and work with my grandfather most summer and winter breaks till into my early 20s. Among many jobs I had was aging sheep when we draftiing them. This was done by counting the number of lower jaw incisor teeth they had ! to or only milk teeth wer lamb, 4 were hogget and 6 were mutton. A tireless job as often a focf over 1000 to do and the sheep werr often cranky.
So as i grew up a lot of mutton in various cuts and means, and we ate a lot of the offal. We did have occasional wild (feral) goat but not a huge amount as not huge in numbers but also quite canny and elusive. They caused a lot of damage to native trees as they would strip their bark of in drier periods and kill them.
Thank you for the curries to consider and totally love turnips ! And swedes, and sweet potato....
And last thanks a lot for the Aloo Gosht (spell check may have altered previous) recipe. This takes me back to 1985 and was my first attempt at any cooking from the "subcontinent" From the Australian Womens Weekly Indian Cookbook It turned out well but a bit tricky as no second pot to do the rice, and had doubled the quantity as a big dinner. Kucky our landlords lived down the street and were happy to lend us some extra cooking gear1. Did have a mortar and pestle ( a 21st birthday present) so able to
do fresh ground spices. A fond cooking memory and think my grandfather would have liked.
He taught me most of the basics of cooking.
One of his fav stews was slow cooked neck stew and shannf. Many people then fed this too their dogs.
And,`` for your red meat eating lover mother, his fav roast mutton was a cut called the Saddle (Google) if you are not aware. A cut that you never see in butcheries and young butchers often don't know. It can be quite big in mutton. like 3 kg. Even though from mutton, it is usually a lot nore tender as the loin is not such an active muscle group. Was once a mainstay of roast meat in swank hotels especially for Sunday lunch.
A lot of debate about how to carve ie parallel to the bone or transversely from the skin side to the bone. The latter by far the better in my view, and same goes for the leg. It looks better and you are cutting through the meat fibres at sort of 90 degrees, and I think less wastage. And like
all roast meat and grilled meat, it must stand for a while, and longer if a big piece. If you cut too early, the internal temp will drop and the meat won't have set correctly.
Let me know if you ever give it a go !
Love your blogs and the narrative and meaning and explanation has such a nice appeal of
sincerity.
Regards.
Thank you so much. I was never aware of saddle but it sounds spectacular! It will be tough to procure but let me see if there are higher end restaurants in the city where I can find it. Thanks so much for following along.
Hi Maryam. It is certainly hard to find a butcher here who has even heard of the cut now, or one who feels adventurous, though in reality if they are truly butchering, they would be cutting loin of lamb all the time. But a lot of meat is not cut from whole carcases in shops now.
it is called saddle because if it were a horse it is where the saddle would sit. It can be done , I think with the bone (spine in or out, and rolled. It can be a large piece of meat if mutton, but should for example fit in a Weber kettle.
And pretty sure that goat can be done as well
We had a very large Aga stove, which had I think 8 different sized round heating points and one central very big one, with three different sized ovens. It was massively heavy, as solid cast iron and enamel and chrome steel
V old school and “dual fuel”, which meant timber or charcoal, which was best (we made our own for a long time. Quite clever design and had thre four fire boxes. Three for the stove tops and ovens (so you didn’t have to fire up if only needing fewer hot points or ovens, and one for a hot ware system for the kitchen.
Did come across some stuff on line, but leant more talking to my 92 yr old mum who has cooked a saddle or two and used this monster in the 1950s.
Refused to start it up, as that is defiitely a man’s job.
Good luck and let me know how you go.
Really enjoy your blog. Thank you for sharing your culture and your food and your zest for life.
Thanks so much Melanie!
Can’t wait to preorder your cookbook!!
Thank you! Stay tuned!
Loved the blog!
What is the dish in the first photo? It looks amazing. Hoping you'll share its recipe too.
It was lovely! It's mutton with flowers from the moringa plant. If I find the flowers where I live, I will try to recreate the recipe.
Aloo gosht is a comforting dish for sure! Thanks for sharing
Thanks for reading!