I remember the first time I had mutton curry in the Middle East. I thought it was going to be gross, turns out it's delicious. It does seem a shame its not more common in the west.
Actually, in the UK, mutton tends mainly to be eaten by members of Asian, Middle Eastern and Caribbean communities. It's not widely sold in supermarkets all over the country, unlike, say, lamb. And where it is sold in a supermarket it tends to be one product line where there might be several for more common types of meat like beef, pork and lamb.
Mutton is really goat. Lamb is just lamb meat. IMO, lamb is sometimes harder to cook because of the smell - you need the right spices to get rid of the smell. Easy to get mutton in most urban areas in the west - just look for a Halal meat shop.
Yes. Mutton is the meat of the adult sheep, lamb is the meat of a juvenile sheep. The flavor is different, but in a volume-ish way. If you think of the flavor of lamb as being a 4, the strength of the mutton flavor is like a 7-8. It's the same flavor, there's just way more of it.
Lamb is also sheep's flesh, but it's not the same as mutton. Lamb is indeed very commonly available, though usually still in fairly limited selection, but I can't even remember the last time I saw actual mutton for sale.
Why would it be impossible? You shoot the deer, you butcher it, you sell it in the store.
Here in Germany we have „game season“ and you can pre-order it at a lot of butcher shops or even certain supermarket chains. The orders are then basically fulfilled by local hunters and foresters, the meat is inspected like any other meat.
There are a few farms which raise venison, elk, etc. but I think due to chronic wasting disease and other issues they're rare... also your average American just isn't that eager to eat game (unless they're hunters).
Note that "wild boars", being feral hogs, are usually exempt from the meat sale laws.
> In the US it's illegal to sell wild game meat, even between private individuals.
Because I'm a pedantic sort, I'll point out that this isn't completely true. The act you link to governs interstate commerce. Individual states can set different rules that apply for sales that do not cross state lines. I live in Vermont, so I'll use that as an example I know:
Big Game:The only time it is legal to buy or sell big game or the meat of big game within the state is during the open season and for 20 days after the season ends.
The whole feral vs wild animal thing is kind of interesting once you know about it. Until a few years ago, I had no idea that most of the deer in my country are an invasive japanese species that were introduced a few hundred years ago by one guy who thought they looked cool. (as a result, hunting is pretty straightforward. Both permits and stalking wise.)
I've been wondering for a while about doves that people hunt/eat, and the much more common type of dove (rock dove/domestic pigeon) which I presume nobody wants to consume due to its diet and the whole "flying rat" taboo.
All of the nicer grocery stores in my area (Whole Foods, any of the better stocked small chain grocers, but not Kroger/Meijer) stock a wide variety of frozen 'game' meats. Rabbit, boar, venison, etc. Rarely fresh, but always available frozen.
It's all raised specifically for meat though, none of the animals are wild harvested.
I'm not sure about the USA but here in Canada there are legal restrictions on game. In Ontario, you can't sell meat from game. (You can't even give it away, technically, unless it was inspected and butchered by a licensed butcher.)
So any venison in the store will have come from farm-raised deer. And deer are relatively difficult and expensive compared to chickens or cattle.
I can find mutton and venison, and also horse meat, in upscale grocery stores here in Ontario. It's all terribly expensive, except lamb/mutton from NZ when it's in season.
I've eaten mutton in the US, in China, in India, in Afghanistan, in Pakistan, in Iran, in Iraq, in Turkey, in Greece… I think your theory doesn't stand up to scrutiny.
I don't eat mutton regularly, but when I do I can notice the difference between mutton and lamb.
Last time I've eaten, like a month ago, we asked the waiter what was the difference between two plates and she told us basically that, one was more tender with a light flavour, the other one was stronger.
"mutton" in the middle east might well have been goat rather than sheep (common usage in indian english, and it's spread to bits of the middle east too)
Never had mutton myself but other meats I like that are uncommon to find in US grocers are duck, quail, and goat. Duck has gotten easier to find I suppose, the whole foods near me will sell both whole and breasts. I don't remember this being the case 3 years ago.
But finding goat is very hard. I don't tend to go to butchers since there are none near me within walking distance.
When I lived in Florida I'd routinely eat at Caribbean or Dominican or other tropical cuisine restaurants that would all serve goat. Some of my favorite meals I've ever had were in those small hole-in-the-wall places.
My local costco sells large boxes of frozen cubed goat meat, and maybe entire goats. (Theres occasionally something large wrapped in burlap next to where the goat cubes are stored in the freezer).
I don't have a need for a 15 pound box much less whole animal, so haven't bought it. Will get a duck from them later this fall though.
I honestly can't believe duck isn't more popular in the US. Yes, it's more expensive than chicken but part of that (I suspect) is its rarity. But unlike lamb (which I love) being something of an acquired taste, duck is unambiguously delicious.
My only real guess is that both duck and lamb–to me–seem more sensitive in general to preparation. Beef, chicken, and pork are less enjoyable when they're not cooked well but they're still alright. Duck and lamb seem significantly less enjoyable when they're prepared badly.
Duck is absolutely great, there's a Thai restaurant near me that makes a great tasting fried duck breast with a peanut sauce. Incredibly crispy, incredibly delicious. Highly underrated meat as you said.
> Beef, chicken, and pork are less enjoyable when they're not cooked well but they're still alright.
I get that you don't really mean "well" in the steak sense, but I still can't help but to think of how I love medium rare. I will tolerate rare and up to medium well (to a point), but actual well is a hard no.
I grew up thinking I hate steak because my family think the slightest hint of pink is poison. Even my younger brothers, so it's not a generational thing. It gets weird when we meet up and one of them wants to grill the meat, I have to snatch my meat off the grill like a cat burglar because nobody else will respect my preference and try to chase me away (they're completely convinced I'm reckless for this.)
I think it falls in the same trap as lamb, mutton and goat. Americans don't like food with a lot of flavor. That's also why there are fairly few fermented foods that are commonly eaten and why Tilapia is a popular fish.
I posted this above, but its because its much much cheaper and turkey can be farmed on a scale which is very difficult to do with duck or geese.
Its not banned from our table, but it would get the same reception from my family as if I had heated up some microwave meals. But we grew up on farms and had good access to better alternatives.
BTW, if you like duck, try Goose for thanksgiving, and make sure you use the fat if making roasted potatoes.
To me the surprise is the popularity of turkey over duck and goose. Turkey is cheaper, but needs to be prepared really well in order to be mediocre. A badly cooked duck or goose is much better than a perfect turkey. The ceiling for goose is high and even higher for duck, but the floor is already pretty high.
Turkey is much much cheaper to raise in quantity than duck or goose. In my family it would be rare to use a turkey for an occasion, its just not interesting.
I really despise duck. It has an irredeemably off flavor that overwhelms whatever it’s served with. The preferred way to address this in Western cuisine seems to be sickly-sweet glazes and jellies, which are no better.
Love lamb though. Different strokes for different folks?
I'm surprised you guys don't eat much duck, it's also really good. Do you eat goose? We often have that instead of Turkey, although it's a lot smaller.
Preparation is probably a big factor. Some meat houses ('churrascarias') serve grilled mutton here but I can't stand the taste, it immediately remembers me of a smelly rain-soaked lamb. But I ate mutton in a dinner in England, decided to eat it quietly out of politeness to the host, but it didn't taste bad at all.
yea but I wonder if folks would still care about "gameyness" if they ate it from birth
one thing that you often notice moving from abroad is that the pork in North America (raw) smells and tastes like piss. but if you're used to it you just don't question it
I haven't noticed that but it's been quite a while since I cooked unprocessed raw pork. I wonder if the intense ammonia smell that builds up in pig factories had anything to do with the smell you experienced.
Exactly, the same reason we don't eat goat either.
Goat BBQ is absolutely delicious. But it is a strong flavor that lingers for a long time. It's just not palatable for the average American consumer to eat on a regular basis.
On the one hand I absolutely wish we had a wider variety of meats available. But on the other hand I totally understand why there isn't enough demand for it to be economically viable.
I was about to post the same thing here. BBQ mutton from Moonlite in Owensboro, KY is one of my favorite foods, second only to their burgoo made with mutton. Long, long ago, Owensboro was a major wool production center and river port and there was often a surplus of sheep, so they ate mutton.
It's not just Moonlite and Owensboro; it's common further downriver too. I end up in Paducah at least once a year, and I always try to make it to Kountry Kastle for a mutton sandwich.
I'd say that mutton and burgoo are the defining elements of Kentucky BBQ.
I searched "Kentucky" in the comments here precisely because of thinking of my time in Owensboro, where my uncle moved to many years ago. That barbecue mutton was utterly fantastic when I had it :)
I wish I could find mutton easier! I've always loved "Gamey" meats. I've mostly only found mutton at Halal butchers, and only some times. Rarely at extremely "high-end", bougie butchers, and very expensive.
Move to Michigan! Our large Middle Eastern and African population ensures you'll always be able to get it from any stand alone butcher and very often at your normal grocery store.
I (American) think the gamey taste is exactly what most American's do not like at this point. Any time lamb, elk, bison, etc. are an option (usually at a restaurant), people voice complaints about gaminess and order beef (in my experience/social groups). It doesn't explain why it wasn't part of our food options we grew up with as this article is trying to explain, but I think it's why it's a hard sell today.
I will get lamb occasionally at a restaurant and about half the time it's too gamey for me (and I then regret my ordering decision). We also don't eat a ton of curry dishes where the seasoning and spices can maybe mask or enhance that flavor (I don't know what it does but assuming more flavors results in less noticeable gaminess).
It seems that it's difficult to introduce new meat sources to the market. Bison has been trying hard the past 10-20 years and it's a really good beef-like meat for burgers/steaks but still quite rare to see at a restaurant much less a grocery store.
There is still a big difference from grass fed beef and bison and the leaner meats like elk and venison have a much different flavor and they seem more difficult for me to cook right. I love venison, for example, but I don't always nail it. And it usually helps to spice it or sauce it.
I think bison has become a lot easier to find recently in grocery stores, especially the higher end ones. I enjoy the flavor and I would like to see more pastureland in the U.S. return to bison ranching.
In places where mutton is consumed, I'm curious: is there a distinction between "sheep raised for mutton" and "sheep raised for wool", or is it always both? Do all wool sheep eventually become mutton?
In Greece where we regularly consume sheep it's mostly both, mainly because we don't have specialized breeds for wool. They do exist, but they're rare.
I can't speak to sheep specifically, but we use different species of goats and cattle and chickens when raised for meat vs for dairy or eggs.
Still, dairy cows do eventually become beef. If you ever see a cut of beef that's normally bone-in but the butcher chose to debone this one, then there's a good chance it was from a dairy cow whose bones were too calcified to saw through.
I was under the impression that lamb was from young sheep raised explicitly for meat, while mutton was from old sheep after their wool career was over, but I can't say I've investigated it deeply.
Just to add to the mutton pool, you also have old female sheeps that are no longer able to give birth.
There's a chap in Cornwall adding value to these old ladies by giving them a bit of a retirement, getting them fit and healthy before slaughtering and dry aging them for some top UK restaurants. Check out The Cornwall Project - Matt Chatfield.
Bit more about it here - https://www.scottgrummett.com/blog/the-cornwall-project.
I am not affiliated, but would like to try it someday.
I'm the cook in our household and for me the article doesn't quite capture my observations... maybe it's because of my location, but it isn't easy to find lamb in my local grocery stores and it is at a super premium relative to other options. The lamb available is so flavorful that I can't imagine something even stronger. Having checked with butcher shops, anything they can get that would be local (rather than from NZ or AUS) is even more expensive, and generally only ground or chops. So... I'm seeing a catch-22 here where it's not really available, therefore people don't eat it. And if the cost is x2+ of other choices, people are going to think carefully about their budget.
Finally, it really is a unique flavor that even for all my culinary explorations, I see it as an occasional change-of-pace rather than a regular part of our menu. Great as doner / gyro, individual kebabs, in stews, but beyond that I continue to be at a loss of what to do with it.
Yeah - sounds a lot like the various dishes across a range from the Mediterranean to the "-stans" that I've made with lamb. No reason I couldn't use mutton - if it were available. I've had some lamb that was absolutely overpowering, so having a hard time imaging something more than that.
I've only eaten mutton in heavily spiced dishes and it does go very well in those settings - you need other strong flavors to stand up to the gaminess of the mutton, which might be why it hasn't caught on in American cuisine which tends to focus less on heavy spice profiles and more on just cooking ingredients to present their natural flavors.
Here in Michigan mutton is not overly difficult to get (lots of middle eastern and african immigrants) but it's a hard sell to anyone that didn't grow up eating it.
Lamb (as you said) have a strong but not unpleasant flavor. Mutton takes that flavor dial and turns it way up.
in my lifetime, Americans have been steadily losing their taste for not just gamy but other strong flavors as well. Endives used to be just plain bitter, for people who liked bitter, now you can safely put them in a kid's salad. It's sad. And I think other cultures are and will keep losing their tastes too; I've noticed for instance, that not all Chinese like chowing down on all the weird parts of animals, and Europe has plenty of the same "supermarket cheese" that Americans have.
On the plus side, worldwide people have expanded their palates a lot in a way that increases the range and diversity of what they eat, but in terms of the globalized ingredients we can lay our hands on there is still a general regression toward a very mean mean.
It's sad, I think there's a negative feedback loop of, supermarkets only selling the most common produce, and people only learning recipes that use the produce supermarkets sell.
I'd say it's a strange umami flavor. Tasting something gamey triggers something in my head that says, "oh this is animal scent". Maybe it's more olfactory than flavor?
tastes are pretty much all olfactory, except ... what is it, salt, sweet, sour, bitter, and the "fifth taste", umami? and if i'm not mistaken that means just "sourness", not "sour flavor like lemon vs lime" which is olfactory
The only sad thing here is how you're trying to generalize a few billion people with high-brow "I like it and if you don't, the you're wrong" assertions.
Here's something that might rile you up: I enjoy spicy food, but sometimes I'll buy mild salsa because I don't always want cry my way through an appetizer or snack. I must be uncultured, huh?
Finally, and this might come as a shock, but maybe your tastebuds have changed as you've gotten older. Endives might not be as bitter to you now due to this change, but they still might be pungent to other people who don't eat them as frequently.
(I really wish HN had a downvote/dislike button. Maybe I need to level-up first before I get that option...)
because I still every so often get served some lamb that is gamy and I can taste it just fine, I feel that I still know what it tastes like. And I can tell the difference between beef, more aged beef, and lamb, and I while I like flavorful beef (don't serve me filet), and lamb and gamy lamb, I don't actually like the flavor of more extreme-aged beef; so since my tasting of things hits some subtle difference buttons, and all the scale buttons I used to, I feel like it's still reliable.
Chicory lettuce (which is now hard to find) and dandelion greens are bitter, and they used to be bitter and I used to and still like them. It is true that children (little boys) don't like bitter and grown men do (more than do women), so yes, taste buds shift, but I showed awareness and acknowledged that by saying "now you can serve endive to children"
> The only sad thing here is how you're trying to generalize a few billion people with high-brow "I like it and if you don't, the you're wrong" assertions.
He does have a point though. Many people, especially older generations, keep complaining that everything has gone bland / tastes the same... the problem at its core is that, thanks to market consolidation and efficiency, there aren't that many different varieties of produce and animals grown any more at scale.
Producers select for predictable amount of weight, fast growth, low variance in taste and especially long shelf life, and so we end up with 30-ish varieties of seeds producing 95% of our food, where 10 companies dominate 74% of the world market [1]. In animals, it's the same - out of 80 domestic breeds of farm animals in Germany, for example, 56 are threatened [2], and even back in 2000 the problem was already recognized for other continents [3].
> (I really wish HN had a downvote/dislike button. Maybe I need to level-up first before I get that option...)
I eat a lot of chillies - from milder Serrano up to the superhots like bhut jalokia. Jalapenos, in my experience, seem to have the biggest variance in capsaicin per specimen. Sometimes you'll get one that tastes basically like a bell pepper, and sometimes you'll get one that surprises you. Colour doesn't seem to have that much of an impact either. Could be you just got a duff pepper
The TAM (Texas A&M) and NuMex Primavera (New Mexico State U) varieties were selected/hybridized to be milder for consistency for mass food production - eg use by companies like Old El Paso.
When you buy supermarket Jalapeños you aren’t getting to choose the variety (be grateful you’re at least being told that - in the UK they’re just sold as ‘green chilies’ which could be anything) - so depending on the supplier, and whether they are offloading leftovers from a Taco Bell order, it’s going to be pot luck what you get.
It’s not a new thing - TAM peppers date back to the 1980s. Possibly changes in the supply chains during the pandemic are causing more of the milder varieties to end up in supermarkets than before?
> anything they can get that would be local (rather than from NZ or AUS) is even more expensive
This might be key. It might be that your juridiction has trade agreements with other countries and impose that local lamb has cannot be sold cheaper, and if that is the case it would explain why local products are more expensive and lamb/mutton not marketed at all. Talk to local producers to confirm. I don't know about today, but this used to be an issue for lamb manu markets.
I'm cooking a leg of lamb now from my local Safeway. It costs $7/lb, which is the same as chuck roast. But it's maybe 1/4 more expensive due to that big leg bone (which my dog values highly). Still that feels like the price is comparable to beef, but a nice alternative flavor.
In my location, lamb is closer to $10/lb (at grocery stores - higher at butcher), while I can get (grass fed, super high quality) beef straight from the rancher at less than $4/lb.
You have to put a multi-year old sheep through a 6 month gestation period (and most will only go into heat during certain times of year), out of which you are likely to get only one or two lambs, each of which when slaughtered provides at best 10kg of marketable meat, if that.
Compare with chickens (massive egg output, so you get infants practically continually, or cows which while they have many of the same drawbacks, are far more productive, hundreds of kilos of meat from one animal isn't unusual.
The meat used to be much cheaper (at least local to NZ) when sheep were farmed primarily for their wool rather than meat. Basically each ewe could give you 5 or 6 rounds of lambs that were surplus to keeping the population stable and they'd mostly be timed for spring when pasture was productive enough for the extra livestock.
In the UK, lamb is one of the "big 4". If you have a roast dinner it will be chicken, lamb, pork or beef (probably in that order of likelyhood). It's just another meat that you'd roast and slice and eat with gravy and veg.
I probably know more people who dislike pork than dislike lamb. I don't think many people really regard it as an especially strong flavour.
Sometimes I forget what a privilege it is to drive past cows and goats and lambs and chickens, etc. every day. It's hard to imagine a lifestyle where you don't have any interaction with anybody who could connect you to a locally-grown lamb.
Have you asked a search engine for locally grown lambs in your area?
I typed in "locally grown lambs orlando" and "locally grown lambs san diego" and both brought up https://localharvest.org. I have no idea what prices you might find that way.
30 minutes to work, 30 minutes back home, 4 days a week! Not a bit of traffic, aside from school buses or tractors! It's relaxing, and a great time to catch up on podcasts, lectures, or just do some karaoke! And the views are gorgeous!
Just earlier today I stopped in the middle of the road on my way home just to stare in awe at the sunset beaming across the sky onto a huge, billowing, fluffy cloud that was kissing the horizon, rolling green pastures dotted with cows basking in the fading sunlight. I really do underappreciate the beauty of rural living!
I live in rural America, but agrarian does not always mean abundant or diverse. The lamb at the butcher shop comes from about 2 hours away, as does the cream line milk. My beef comes from a family friend 2 hours the other direction. Could I buy a whole lamb from the FFA kids at the fair? Sure, but I don't need a whole lamb and it is more of a charity "for the kids" situation than a good value. Talking with ranchers in both this country and others, I suspect that some urban markets may actually have better access than we do - because they are targeting sales to specific groups (areas with large Muslim communities come to mind...) that they know want the product.
I recently had the experience of moving to a rural area, where I didn't know anyone for 2+hours away. I worked from home.
Within a month I knew a few people to ask if I wanted to buy 1/4 cow or more. It wouldn't have been hard to find lamb or goat either, but would probably need to call a person that knows a person that knows the farmer. By the second hunting season I had two people bring me jerky from their hunt, and offer bargain prices for game meat. Buying rural meat is about having a deep freeze in the garage and buying in bulk.
Aside from the meat, there are several people near me that have egg stands. They put out eggs by the road and have a jar to collect cash. Similar situation for veggie harvest time.
Once a year some coworkers and I split a cow direct from a farm. The butcher arranges all the logistics. Great way to bring down your yearly food budget and you don't have to think about Tyson's questionable bs.
Yeah, where I live lamb comes in tiny shrinkwrapped imported packages and sells for about $40/lb. You can also get similar small frozen packets of camel and ostrich meat in the freezer section. You can not buy mutton anywhere (unless you know a guy). We eat beef, chicken, pork, and turkey all usually in the form of ground beef or grilling steaks, boneless skinless chicken breasts, pork sausages or chops, and whole turkey. Everything else is, as one grocery store clerk put it to my wife, "a little exotic for this continent."
They are probably referring to Veal, which is the meat from a calf or young animal. Note there are a number of controversies the other way also, where people oppose eating young cow because of the practices surrounding raising veal.
No, the beef you buy at Whole Foods or Safeway has generally been harvested from steers slaughtered at 1-2 years old --- it's all young. Specialty purveyors will sell you beef from much older cows, which is less tender and has a much deeper flavor (there's also a high-end thing right now about eating beef from dairy cows).
This seems extremely unlikely, given the relatively small percentage of beef that comes from culled dairy cows, the absolutely vast amount of beef used as an input for fast food, and the named suppliers companies like McDonalds use.
I think they just mixed up their heuristic; fast food vendors always do the cheapest thing at scale, this is often sacrifices quality, but clearly the more economical thing to do is to kill and butcher the cattle ASAP. I mean why would they feed an adult cow for an extra year if they could avoid it?
The common practice is that you butcher bulls at young age, but you keep cows for milk - you actually make much more money on milk than on meat.
With chickens it's even worse: males are killed immediately after hatching, because their meat is worth next to nothing. Females are kept for both eggs and meat.
My understanding is that chickens are bred either for eggs or for meat. Egg farmers cull males as soon as they can (which depends on an interesting technical problem called sexing). Hens that can't lay anymore are called "spent hens", and the meat is not generally liked by Americans at least, so it's probably not what you're buying at the grocery store.
Poultry farmers raise both sexes and slaughter as soon as the bird is large enough.
What? Cow meat is about 25% of the ground beef supply, with half being dairy culls and the other half being beef cows that fail to get pregnant. It ends up at McDonald’s, Taco Bell, and Beef hotdogs.
You can also go to specific chains and look up their sourcing; Wendys sources from "steers and heifers", but all much younger than the average dairy cow cull age.
It's not that I have a high opinion of fast food beef. I just think it's unlikely that they could come close to meeting demand by sourcing from culled cows.
Your 9% number is impossible as at least 10% comes from purely beef production. 25% of ground beef is old cow meat, and it isn’t sold at grocery store meat sections. It ends up in processed foods and fast food. It is legally beef, but that is about all you can say about it.
Look, I honestly don't care --- I actually think it's laudable to put less commercially desirable meat to use, in the same way I think it's a good thing to use transglutaminase to stitch trim and offcuts into chicken nuggets --- but I can't find a single source that suggests culled dairy cows are a significant input to fast food. I can find direct statements from chains that preclude it. I've concluded that it's just not the case. We don't have to agree, but if you've got a source, I'll read it.
There are Iberian preparations for older cattle that are absolutely delicious, FYI. They’re premium priced, however, so I imagine there is care in what they’re fed and how they live.
The mutton industry needs influencers, then. Or maybe a name change. In 1959, a packing company in Auckland came up with the name "kiwi fruit" for Chinese gooseberry.[1] That turned the market around.
Several of the grocery stores in my area carry rabbit in their specialty meat section. If you can't source it locally, there are a good number of suppliers from which you can order it online.
Yeah, I always assumed their relative rarity in grocery stores was because they're labor-intensive to prep and butcher. Same as with small fowl like quail and squab.
Not if you are a coyote. The other day I went out to my kids treehouse and found a fresh rabbit head with nothing else just lying on the bench at the top of the stairs. I have to assume a coyote decided that was the right place to eat a meal.
The Costco near my house sells a large box of frozen mutton cubes, which is the only mutton product I've ever seen at a store in America, and I believe it's mostly purchased by South Asian and Middle Eastern immigrant customers.
What city? The Costcos I've visited in the SF Bay Area usually carry lamb rack and lamb chops (both of which are delicious!), but I've never seen mutton. I'd love to find it.
I used to get lamb chops at Albertson's in college (it must not have been expensive since I was dirt poor) and it tasted really great. Like kind of a spicier tasting steak. It definitely wasn't gamey at all.
This is a Harold McGee thing, originally, and skatole is a determinant of the gamey or barnyardy flavor of lamb as well; further, it's probably more prevalent/dominant in higher-end heritage lamb than in factory lamb.
I heard this sentiment from co-workers and friends who didnt grow up eating goat. I think it boils down to two different things:
1. "meat musk" (lack of a better word, lol): People dont realize how pungent beef can be, its just that most Americans are accustomed to it. You can really smell this with grass-fed beef. I think goat/lamb meat is "musky" for the same reasons, as they eat mainly from foraging/hay.
2. preparation/cooking: If you plan on cooking goat like a steak, its not a gonna taste good. Generally, most dishes require that the goat is simmered or slow-cooked to make the meat more tender. Spices also make a big difference here with the dish.
In the UK, lamb is pretty much an everyday meat (well - every week...) but goat is regarded as pretty exotic - common mainly in Afro-caribbean takeaways or restaurants. (I'm from the South-East so this might not be true in other regions).
Mutton - I don't recall seeing very often at all in butcher shops. As the meat in takeway - it's more common but sometimes the terminology isn't precise. Some Indian takeaways use the word "meat" when they mean something sheep-based. And "mutton" sometimes means "goat" (and vice-versa). And "mutton" sometimes is just lamb...
Same in South Africa...."mutton" usually refers to lamb. almost no one has a "lamb curry" or "lamb bunny" (Google it). It's "mutton curry" or a "mutton bunny".
Mutton/lamb is the most delicious of all non-fish meats.
I don't particularly love beef/chicken/pork but a sunday lamb roast with crispy potatoes and gravy - yum.
BUT - cooking lamb well is an art and takes alot of practice. You can't just go cook lamb any old way and think it will be delicious. If you want to learn how to cook lamb well then focus on slow cooking and slow roasting - and anticipate you won't really knock people out with it until you've practiced enough. Jamie Oliver has the best lamb roast recipes.
Lamb leg is extremely cheap at the moment in Australia - $10/KG - so I am practicing my lamb leg roasting skills.
Ruminants inherently have large methane output that drives up climate impact. There are only very early efforts to reduce methane output through diet change.
Sheep grazing also strips the land bare of deep and complex vegetation upending whole ecosystems. Perhaps in a futile or misguided gesture I try to keep my consumption of lamb to an occasional treat rather than a regular thing.
Wouldn't this depend on location and source? I used to live in Scotland, where sheep graze on grass in fields that don't really take away space for vegetables (unless you want to survive on potatoes and cabbage), and they're local. So I assumed they're not that bad.
Most of the sheep grazing land in the UK isn't natural - natural trees and vegetation were cleared to make way for more sheep. It's had a large impact on the biodiversity here.
For leg, shank, or shoulder chop I would agree with you - a slow roast or braise is the right way to go. But the rack is incredibly tender and easy to cook. Throw some salt, pepper, garlic, and Italian seasoning on it and put it in the oven at 375F, it's perfect in about 25 mins. No cooking skills necessary.
At my local Costco, imported Aussie lamb racks are usually about $15/lb.
Wow, disagree - I find that the sweet spot with a rack is very small, maybe 2-3 minutes. Outside of that, it's either too pink or overdone. Maybe it's just me :(
For me, the easiest lamb cut to cook is shoulder - just throw it in a low oven for 3+ hours (with some white wine, rosemary, parsley, garlic and lemon), and it's the most delicious lamb you've ever had!
Yeah, the window of time when you need to pull it so that it's good. As in, pull it 2 minutes one way and it's not done, 2 minutes the other way and it's overdone.
Just use a meat thermometer. I guess that's a skill but it's an easy one. Pull it 5-10 degrees (F) before your target temp. I get consistent medium rare every time.
I love a braise too! But it takes some planning and it's more work. I can go from "hmmm, what dinner" to plated lamb rack in 45 mins - including defrost time.
I was going to say, Americans don't generally eat mutton but lamb isn't terribly uncommon. Lamb is already difficult to get right, which is why many go out to get it (Indian and Middle Eastern, most commonly); mutton is even more difficult, so people don't even bother either way.
In addition, goat isn't often eaten in Europe (outside of the Mediterranean, Italy primarily) and other affluent nations, but is fairly common (at least in the Southwest and New York+DC) via Latin American, Middle Eastern and African cuisine infusion.
I did a boneless leg roast on Friday and it came out very tender. I spread softened butter with herbs all over the top, then put it in at 425F for 15 minutes, followed by a couple hours at 350F until it was ~140F in the center. Juicy, tender, and nicely pink inside. The leftovers made a couple great sandwiches and finally ended up as a stir fry last night.
Americans do ourselves a huge disservice by ignoring lamb (and mutton, and goat, and wild game, and...)
Well if you want to cook mutton right then don't just roast it with potatoes in the oven. Make a nice pilaf with it, with a whole head of garlic in the center like they do in Uzbekistan:
(the meat in the video is goat, not mutton, but it's the same recipe).
Or, my favourite (and a recipe handed down by my grandfather, though it skipped a generation): Gioulbasi, a whole leg of mutton wrapped in wax paper, with vegetables and melty cheese, and roasted slow and sweet:
I think it comes from Smyrni and the old Greek cities in the coast of Asia Minor, who were for a while a part of Turkey (until the Greeks there were slaughtered like lambs).
Anyway we have lots of Turkish loan words in the Greek language. To the best of my ability to transliterate these examples in latin characters: ati, passoumi, briki (ibrik, I think), kazani, charatsi, tsoglani, bairaki, chatiri, dounias, giouroussi, boulouki, dragoumanos, doulapi, and derti, of course, etc. As you can probably tell, we always tend to add an "-i" at the end.
We also say "halali" and "harami", which we clearly took from the Turkish.
And of course, Tsantirimin Oustoune, and other all time greatest hits:
These views are strange to me. You can most definitely cook it any old way. It's not as if the Middle Eastern restaurants or kebab joints are slow roasting the stuff. You can pressure cook it for certain meals (i.e lamb shanks) but it's not that necessary. Lamb chops can also be cooked much in the same way as beef steaks.
The most tender part is the backstrap (its marbled like wagyu) and incredibly easy to prepare and skewer. This is followed by the legs. You can even go one step further and skewer more fat inbetween.
Otherwise, pan frying it with basic seasoning is fine.
I grew up on it, and have probably cooked it about ~150 times for other people. It's always been a hit and I'm not exactly a chef ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
>> Otherwise, pan frying it with basic seasoning is fine.
No, make it into a pilaf. In a ceramic oven vessel. If you're from the Middle East, or anywhere around the Mediterranean, that's what your heart yearns for, and your heart knows best.
Also, saturated fats but that's not why I brought up your heart :P
> These views are strange to me. You can most definitely cook it any old way
The thing that cracks me up are yuppies caring for their cast iron skillet like it’s a newborn baby. “You can’t use soap on it… You can’t treat it like that… To maintain it you must…”
I promise that generations of dirt poor Southerners had bigger things to worry about than following Alton Brown’s directions for cast iron maintenance.
I inherited my pan 20 years ago; it ws in poor shape. I stripped it with caustic soda, and re-seasoned it, which took about a day elapsed. Ever since, it gets washed-up using detergent, and immediately dried. It's as good as when I first seasoned it. I've never had to repair the finish.
IIRC he went to culinary school with the intent of becoming TV Chef. A lot of his early stuff was lifted right out of a culinary school program.
It's possible that your grandma has a lot more classical cooking skills than you think. A good bit of "southern cooking" is classical French cooking that's evolved over time and has been adapted for local ingredients.
To me the whole point is that it’s indestructible/recoverable. Things go really south you can steel wool / sand it and re-season. If it’s any coated pan it’s not usable for cooking after it takes some damage
In fairness, it's nice to know how best to avoid needing to sand/reseason more than necessary due to preventable mishaps. It's not a fun chore to have to add to your list.
I use soap every wash on well-seasoned cast iron too, no problem at all. You need to make sure to wash all the soap off, and dry it well -- or at least I believe it's important to do that, I guess since I always do it, I could be making assumptions too, maybe it's just fine if you don't?!
But yeah, the idea that you have to leave the cooking grease and fat on cast iron and aren't allowed to use soap to cut the grease and get it off.... is an odd one.
I blame the novel Silence of the Lambs. It has some weird aside where it mentions that soap never touches her cast iron pan. So the pretension has existed long before Alton Brown showed up.
This is a fantastic take. I’d never thought about this before but you’re right that this might be Patient 0 of the modern rich white person’s exposure to cast iron and associated care.
“Mapp had inherited her grandmother’s skillet and used it often. It had a glassy black surface that no soap ever touched. Starling put it in front of her on the table.”
I read the series long after publication date and remembered going, “wait, the no soap thing has been around THAT long?”
Soaps had lye that would've washed away the seasoning on the pan. Today's common dish detergents do not, so this is just advice that used to be helpful, but it isn't anymore.
Some people are stuck in their ways, never really understood why they shouldn't use soap in the first place, or didn't notice that the soap they grew up with is different from today's dish detergents... I think there's a lesson to be learned here about re-evaluating our assumptions every so often and not doing things just because that's how they've always been done.
This red herring is presented with such delicious haste every single time cast iron cookware is mentioned. I think it's because of some pop-science cooking channel on the internet
While I will not pretend to know all the reasons in fact that this practice has reached such common use, washing your cast iron pan with soap won't strip the seasoning that is already set, but it will strip all of the unset oils left over from cooking that are on the surface. If you spend tons of time maintaining cast irons, you will find that the single most important practice to building a smooth surface that never sticks is leaving a thin (towel dry / buffed, leave too much and it turns sticky) film of oil on the surface of the pan after every use. If you need to or want to use soap to remove the (again, unset non-seasoning) layer of oil on the surface, you can dry off the pan, add some oil and buff it with a towel before storing. Using some heat during this process, but not smoking the oil is necessary to expand the pores of the pan (or make the oil more viscous and better fill the static surface of the pan, whichever mental model helps you sleep). This process takes extra time and effort to achieve the effect you already have with a well seasoned cast iron after cooking: Food debris washes right off with some light scrubbing and water, leaving a clean surface with a thin layer of oil on the top that has nicely filled all the cracks on the surface.
You can clean cast iron with soap of course, if you're using it often and well you don't have to. Most of the time all I need to do is wipe it clean with a paper towel and let it be like that until I use it again a few hours later.
I figure this is probably what those "dirt poor southerns" were doing too, since it's simple and effective.
I’m mostly wondering about why the “cast iron” part is relevant. If a wipe is enough for that type of pan, isn’t it good enough for all of your pans? If there’s food stuck on, you’re obviously going to do whatever it takes to remove that. But when that isn’t the case, is a simple wipe good enough?
Copper and stainless steel invariably get food adhered to them very well. (Try cooking eggs in stainless steel) A properly-seasoned cast iron pan is, in many ways, like a teflon-coated one. So, I suppose my comment would go for teflon-coated pans, as well.
If I still used stainless steel, you bet I'd be soaking them overnight then scrubbing the hell out of them in the sink the next morning.
I think it really depends on how often you use it. If you use it every day, then I think wiping it down (maybe with a bit of added oil depending on what you just cooked) is more than adequate most of the time. If you use it once a week then put it in a cupboard before using it again, then you'd want to clean it more thoroughly because you might get stuff growing on it otherwise.
That's the point, the oil from the seasoning process (or rather, the residue it leaves behind) is not dirt, it's an actual layer of coating - and if you use soap on it you wash away the coating.
No, sorry, if it washes away you have not seasoned it properly - it should be carbonised and bonded (polymerised?) to the actual pan, not just a layer of grease sitting on top.
I have multiple cast iron items in my kitchen that I can wash with washing-up liquid, gently scour with wire wool even (sure, too much vigour would probably start to remove it, or at very least scratch up the surface and make it harder to clean/things stick more) with no problem or loss of seasoning.
A product having once been ubiquitous, and it's maintenance therefore common knowledge that you'd pick up by habit, does not mean it's stupid to have to pay attention to this knowledge many decades later.
Some misconceptions do exist, for example dish soap not usually being a detergent that damages the patina nowadays. While other practices are a development, like our general food hygiene standards having changed significantly, and keeping a patina on cookware therefore requiring more deliberate attention.
> You can't just go cook lamb any old way and think it will be delicious.
Maybe I'm just Italian, but if you just toss a lamb/mutton shank into your otherwise boring red sauce (which you were already cooking low and slow, right?) it goes a long way.
> cooking lamb well is an art and takes alot of practice. You can't just go cook lamb any old way and think it will be delicious. If you want to learn how to cook lamb well then focus on slow cooking and slow roasting
Hold on, are we talking about lamb or mutton?
Lamb is extremely forgiving. It's tender and has plenty of flavor. It's fine to cook lamb hot and fast like a steak, or low and slow like basically any meat. If you treat lamb like oddly shaped beef or pork you'll be fine.
Mutton is not forgiving, needs to be treated like its own unique thing, and braising it should be your first instinct. If that's what you meant and it was just a typo, I totally agree with you.
I'd argue it's more a matter of degrees. Chicken is more forgiving than beef, beef more than lamb, etc. Lamb is far from "extremely" forgiving - it's just moreso than mutton.
> Mutton is not forgiving, needs to be treated like its own unique thing, and braising it should be your first instinct. If that's what you meant and it was just a typo, I totally agree with you.
That's all true of lamb too, just not to anywhere near the same extent as mutton.
Lamb is my favourite meat. I eat it weekly at least. I live (and was born and raised) in New Zealand, a country known for the best lamb in the world. So, no.
That's true for breast, but thigh and leg meat is extremely forgiving (as long as you don't undercook it). Once you get it to "shred with a fork" status, you basically can't ruin its texture until you char it into rubber.
For breast, the trick is to pound it to ~3/4 inch thickness and then dry brine for at least 30 minutes. So much easier to get it evenly cooked and tender all the way through:
I beg to differ. Difficulty depends upon the recipe.
Lamb/mutton tagines are incredibly easy to make. They’re basically “throw it into a slow cooker and come back eight hours later” dishes. You can improve the flavor by browning, but the simplest versions are still wonderfully delicious and basically idiot proof.
A tip from my grandpa who was a sheep farmer and roasted plenty of lamb legs: coat it in vegemite before putting it in the oven. Sounds weird and gross I know, but it creates a salty, crispy crust that keeps the juices in.
Lamb is very robust actually. It can be cooked rare or slow cooked and anywhere in between and still be delicious because it’s often fatty and marbled.
I make an absolutely tidy mutton saag with mature spinach leaf and lots of cardamom and mustard. Make sure you get a really good colour on the mutton before you stew it.
I love curry but can't help feeling that meat as delicious as good lamb or fish is wasted in the strong flavor of the curry - better to have a vegetarian curry and enjoy the curry flavors on their own, cook the lamb separately.
Well cooked lamb is so delicious it - in my opinion should be eaten only with gravy or a tiny dab of mustard or tiny dab of mint sauce.
There’s an assumption that ingredients taste good on their own in the west. Most Asian cuisine relies heavily on creating a fantastic spice mix that the meat provides a background flavor to. Texture also matters a lot. The background flavor is not interchangeable.
For instance I love fish curries but can’t stand regular roasted/steamed fish lightly flavored with salt, dill, butter etc.
The main point I got from the OP was that mutton (meat from sheep over 2 years old) and lamb (meat from sheep younger than 1 year) have pretty different taste and other culinary qualities as meat. In particular, that mutton is much stronger flavored and tougher, lamb more tender and delicately flavored.
Yet the comments section is full of people treating them interchangeably, replying to someone who talked about mutton by talking about lamb, or vice versa, or talking about "lamb/mutton". I'm not sure if the commentors disagree with the OP and think it's over-stating the difference? Or just aren't really paying attention.
I (who live in the USA) have had plenty of lamb, but have never had mutton. So I can't say from personal experience.
But this is one of those HN articles where the comments section seems entirely divorced from the article.
Please try Rogan ghosht if you have not. That recipe when done right is the perfect mutton curry ever made. This is a recipe from North India, then there's South Indian mutton curries that tastes quite good, particularly the ones in South of Tamilnadu.
In the western US there were some pretty violent confrontations between sheep and cattle ranchers, with the cattle folks seemingly coming out ahead in a lot of cases.
520 comments
[ 4.5 ms ] story [ 396 ms ] threadIt does require knowing how to prepare it in order to overcome the gamey flavor though. (Greek recipes are good and approachable)
Here in Germany we have „game season“ and you can pre-order it at a lot of butcher shops or even certain supermarket chains. The orders are then basically fulfilled by local hunters and foresters, the meat is inspected like any other meat.
There are a few farms which raise venison, elk, etc. but I think due to chronic wasting disease and other issues they're rare... also your average American just isn't that eager to eat game (unless they're hunters).
Note that "wild boars", being feral hogs, are usually exempt from the meat sale laws.
Because I'm a pedantic sort, I'll point out that this isn't completely true. The act you link to governs interstate commerce. Individual states can set different rules that apply for sales that do not cross state lines. I live in Vermont, so I'll use that as an example I know:
Big Game: The only time it is legal to buy or sell big game or the meat of big game within the state is during the open season and for 20 days after the season ends.
https://www.eregulations.com/vermont/hunting/general-regulat....
This was a surprise to me when I moved to Vermont. I grew up in Wisconsin, which (at least when I was there) followed the rules that you quoted.
I've been wondering for a while about doves that people hunt/eat, and the much more common type of dove (rock dove/domestic pigeon) which I presume nobody wants to consume due to its diet and the whole "flying rat" taboo.
I'd imagine there aren't a lot of suppliers or grocery stores carrying it because of the risk
It's all raised specifically for meat though, none of the animals are wild harvested.
So any venison in the store will have come from farm-raised deer. And deer are relatively difficult and expensive compared to chickens or cattle.
I can find mutton and venison, and also horse meat, in upscale grocery stores here in Ontario. It's all terribly expensive, except lamb/mutton from NZ when it's in season.
For me it’s not gross but the flavor is very intense, and gets old quickly. Each time I need a few years break before I can enjoy it again.
Edit: downvoted why?
Last time I've eaten, like a month ago, we asked the waiter what was the difference between two plates and she told us basically that, one was more tender with a light flavour, the other one was stronger.
Just so you know. I did not downvote you.
But finding goat is very hard. I don't tend to go to butchers since there are none near me within walking distance.
When I lived in Florida I'd routinely eat at Caribbean or Dominican or other tropical cuisine restaurants that would all serve goat. Some of my favorite meals I've ever had were in those small hole-in-the-wall places.
I don't have a need for a 15 pound box much less whole animal, so haven't bought it. Will get a duck from them later this fall though.
My only real guess is that both duck and lamb–to me–seem more sensitive in general to preparation. Beef, chicken, and pork are less enjoyable when they're not cooked well but they're still alright. Duck and lamb seem significantly less enjoyable when they're prepared badly.
I get that you don't really mean "well" in the steak sense, but I still can't help but to think of how I love medium rare. I will tolerate rare and up to medium well (to a point), but actual well is a hard no.
We switched to duck instead a few years back and it's positively wonderful. Anyone who eats with us admits it's way better than turkey.
I have no idea why it's not more popular...
Its not banned from our table, but it would get the same reception from my family as if I had heated up some microwave meals. But we grew up on farms and had good access to better alternatives.
BTW, if you like duck, try Goose for thanksgiving, and make sure you use the fat if making roasted potatoes.
Love lamb though. Different strokes for different folks?
Because they don't have a whole lot of gamey flavors. That, and lamb is seen as an upper class food in the US when it comes to home preparation.
one thing that you often notice moving from abroad is that the pork in North America (raw) smells and tastes like piss. but if you're used to it you just don't question it
Goat BBQ is absolutely delicious. But it is a strong flavor that lingers for a long time. It's just not palatable for the average American consumer to eat on a regular basis.
On the one hand I absolutely wish we had a wider variety of meats available. But on the other hand I totally understand why there isn't enough demand for it to be economically viable.
I'd say that mutton and burgoo are the defining elements of Kentucky BBQ.
Unrelated humor: I searched "pqm bbq chicago" on duckduckgo.com and on the map, just west of PQM there's a marker for "Duck Duck Goat" :D
I will get lamb occasionally at a restaurant and about half the time it's too gamey for me (and I then regret my ordering decision). We also don't eat a ton of curry dishes where the seasoning and spices can maybe mask or enhance that flavor (I don't know what it does but assuming more flavors results in less noticeable gaminess).
It seems that it's difficult to introduce new meat sources to the market. Bison has been trying hard the past 10-20 years and it's a really good beef-like meat for burgers/steaks but still quite rare to see at a restaurant much less a grocery store.
If you are used to that and then try a steak from a strictly pasture (grass) fed cow, it will have a distinctly different flavor.
Still, dairy cows do eventually become beef. If you ever see a cut of beef that's normally bone-in but the butcher chose to debone this one, then there's a good chance it was from a dairy cow whose bones were too calcified to saw through.
I raise hair sheep (Katahdin/Barbados crosses) , which produce no useful (that I've seen) wool. But are fantastic in terms of meat.
I'm starting to see a market for them in the specialty realm (beyond halal/kosher/immigrant markets)
I'm thinking I'll need to eventually set up something like this: https://www.deepsouthventures.com/i-sell-onions-on-the-inter...
Finally, it really is a unique flavor that even for all my culinary explorations, I see it as an occasional change-of-pace rather than a regular part of our menu. Great as doner / gyro, individual kebabs, in stews, but beyond that I continue to be at a loss of what to do with it.
I've never eaten mutton, but I'm wondering if its stronger flavor would be fine in that stew.
Lamb (as you said) have a strong but not unpleasant flavor. Mutton takes that flavor dial and turns it way up.
On the plus side, worldwide people have expanded their palates a lot in a way that increases the range and diversity of what they eat, but in terms of the globalized ingredients we can lay our hands on there is still a general regression toward a very mean mean.
but yes, "arrrrr, this is animal scent"
Here's something that might rile you up: I enjoy spicy food, but sometimes I'll buy mild salsa because I don't always want cry my way through an appetizer or snack. I must be uncultured, huh?
Finally, and this might come as a shock, but maybe your tastebuds have changed as you've gotten older. Endives might not be as bitter to you now due to this change, but they still might be pungent to other people who don't eat them as frequently.
(I really wish HN had a downvote/dislike button. Maybe I need to level-up first before I get that option...)
Chicory lettuce (which is now hard to find) and dandelion greens are bitter, and they used to be bitter and I used to and still like them. It is true that children (little boys) don't like bitter and grown men do (more than do women), so yes, taste buds shift, but I showed awareness and acknowledged that by saying "now you can serve endive to children"
He does have a point though. Many people, especially older generations, keep complaining that everything has gone bland / tastes the same... the problem at its core is that, thanks to market consolidation and efficiency, there aren't that many different varieties of produce and animals grown any more at scale.
Producers select for predictable amount of weight, fast growth, low variance in taste and especially long shelf life, and so we end up with 30-ish varieties of seeds producing 95% of our food, where 10 companies dominate 74% of the world market [1]. In animals, it's the same - out of 80 domestic breeds of farm animals in Germany, for example, 56 are threatened [2], and even back in 2000 the problem was already recognized for other continents [3].
> (I really wish HN had a downvote/dislike button. Maybe I need to level-up first before I get that option...)
Yup, IIRC it used to be 500-ish points?
[1] https://utopia.de/sponsored-content/saatgut-diversitaet-bedr...
[2] https://www.ble.de/SharedDocs/Pressemitteilungen/DE/2022/220...
[3] https://www.deutschlandfunk.de/fao-immer-mehr-nutztierrassen...
So you can’t really trust grandma when she tells you food used to taste better back in the old days.
What have they done? Bred all the spice out of all hot peppers ?
The TAM (Texas A&M) and NuMex Primavera (New Mexico State U) varieties were selected/hybridized to be milder for consistency for mass food production - eg use by companies like Old El Paso.
When you buy supermarket Jalapeños you aren’t getting to choose the variety (be grateful you’re at least being told that - in the UK they’re just sold as ‘green chilies’ which could be anything) - so depending on the supplier, and whether they are offloading leftovers from a Taco Bell order, it’s going to be pot luck what you get.
It’s not a new thing - TAM peppers date back to the 1980s. Possibly changes in the supply chains during the pandemic are causing more of the milder varieties to end up in supermarkets than before?
This might be key. It might be that your juridiction has trade agreements with other countries and impose that local lamb has cannot be sold cheaper, and if that is the case it would explain why local products are more expensive and lamb/mutton not marketed at all. Talk to local producers to confirm. I don't know about today, but this used to be an issue for lamb manu markets.
I haven't seen mutton for sale at any grocery.
And yes, it's terribly expensive, all things lamb, and it makes no sense that it's so expensive.
You have to put a multi-year old sheep through a 6 month gestation period (and most will only go into heat during certain times of year), out of which you are likely to get only one or two lambs, each of which when slaughtered provides at best 10kg of marketable meat, if that.
Compare with chickens (massive egg output, so you get infants practically continually, or cows which while they have many of the same drawbacks, are far more productive, hundreds of kilos of meat from one animal isn't unusual.
Great example of a product that is only viable because it’s inputs would otherwise just be waste.
I probably know more people who dislike pork than dislike lamb. I don't think many people really regard it as an especially strong flavour.
For some reason the lamb available in the US is much more strongly flavoured than what I was used to in the UK, which was usually from UK/Aus/NZ.
Have you asked a search engine for locally grown lambs in your area?
I typed in "locally grown lambs orlando" and "locally grown lambs san diego" and both brought up https://localharvest.org. I have no idea what prices you might find that way.
The concrete jungle just isn’t for me, thanks for the timely reminder! :)
Just earlier today I stopped in the middle of the road on my way home just to stare in awe at the sunset beaming across the sky onto a huge, billowing, fluffy cloud that was kissing the horizon, rolling green pastures dotted with cows basking in the fading sunlight. I really do underappreciate the beauty of rural living!
There are one or two butchers, but you basically have to bring your own animal.
Within a month I knew a few people to ask if I wanted to buy 1/4 cow or more. It wouldn't have been hard to find lamb or goat either, but would probably need to call a person that knows a person that knows the farmer. By the second hunting season I had two people bring me jerky from their hunt, and offer bargain prices for game meat. Buying rural meat is about having a deep freeze in the garage and buying in bulk.
Aside from the meat, there are several people near me that have egg stands. They put out eggs by the road and have a jar to collect cash. Similar situation for veggie harvest time.
With chickens it's even worse: males are killed immediately after hatching, because their meat is worth next to nothing. Females are kept for both eggs and meat.
Poultry farmers raise both sexes and slaughter as soon as the bird is large enough.
You can also go to specific chains and look up their sourcing; Wendys sources from "steers and heifers", but all much younger than the average dairy cow cull age.
It's not that I have a high opinion of fast food beef. I just think it's unlikely that they could come close to meeting demand by sourcing from culled cows.
There are Iberian preparations for older cattle that are absolutely delicious, FYI. They’re premium priced, however, so I imagine there is care in what they’re fed and how they live.
It's also hard to get rabbit in the US.
[1] https://teara.govt.nz/en/kiwifruit/page-2
I agree too, we are one marketing campaign and health fad away from mainstreaming something like mutton or rabbit.
Rabbit: The Other Other White Meat
It's already French, which rules that out (thanks for nothing, Normans!) Maybe Spanish? Añojo? That sounds kinda nice. Like añejo tequila.
For lamb/mutton all I can think of is a Seinfeld reference: "Salad's got nuttin' on this mutton"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-HisCMWaso&themeRefresh=1
I'm actually surprised the article didn't reference it.
You see sheep and goats in hilly, rugged areas of the US, but those are few and far between (and not generally economically viable).
am American
so, how does it taste? whats the trick to preparing it. smother it in gravy?
A very common dish on Capt. Aubrey's table was mutton chops.
I love lamb, but interestingly, even that is too strongly flavored for a lot of Americans. Sad.
There's a halal grocery near me, but I don't remember seeing mutton in their display case. Maybe you can ask for it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=77IoP9r4hOI
one of the interesting points he mentioned was the presence of "skatole" as one of the determinants of the sheepy taste.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skatole
yeah...
If you ask us if we eat Mutton, most of us will have no idea what you are talking about. Just sayin'
1. "meat musk" (lack of a better word, lol): People dont realize how pungent beef can be, its just that most Americans are accustomed to it. You can really smell this with grass-fed beef. I think goat/lamb meat is "musky" for the same reasons, as they eat mainly from foraging/hay.
2. preparation/cooking: If you plan on cooking goat like a steak, its not a gonna taste good. Generally, most dishes require that the goat is simmered or slow-cooked to make the meat more tender. Spices also make a big difference here with the dish.
Mutton - I don't recall seeing very often at all in butcher shops. As the meat in takeway - it's more common but sometimes the terminology isn't precise. Some Indian takeaways use the word "meat" when they mean something sheep-based. And "mutton" sometimes means "goat" (and vice-versa). And "mutton" sometimes is just lamb...
The 1st world diet really does reflect the primitive primate species we are...
I don't particularly love beef/chicken/pork but a sunday lamb roast with crispy potatoes and gravy - yum.
BUT - cooking lamb well is an art and takes alot of practice. You can't just go cook lamb any old way and think it will be delicious. If you want to learn how to cook lamb well then focus on slow cooking and slow roasting - and anticipate you won't really knock people out with it until you've practiced enough. Jamie Oliver has the best lamb roast recipes.
Lamb leg is extremely cheap at the moment in Australia - $10/KG - so I am practicing my lamb leg roasting skills.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/food-emissions-supply-cha...
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/emission-factors-food-tra...
https://news.liverpool.ac.uk/2020/05/11/biodiversity-impact-...
At my local Costco, imported Aussie lamb racks are usually about $15/lb.
For me, the easiest lamb cut to cook is shoulder - just throw it in a low oven for 3+ hours (with some white wine, rosemary, parsley, garlic and lemon), and it's the most delicious lamb you've ever had!
(Because a rack of lamb is fairly thin compared to many meats we roast)
To which I would say: meat thermometers are an amazing gift.
I love a braise too! But it takes some planning and it's more work. I can go from "hmmm, what dinner" to plated lamb rack in 45 mins - including defrost time.
In addition, goat isn't often eaten in Europe (outside of the Mediterranean, Italy primarily) and other affluent nations, but is fairly common (at least in the Southwest and New York+DC) via Latin American, Middle Eastern and African cuisine infusion.
Americans do ourselves a huge disservice by ignoring lamb (and mutton, and goat, and wild game, and...)
https://youtu.be/tkCeL6Md0fg?si=q86eBrLRbJBJU4yi
Or stuff the leg with rice, as they do on the Greek island of Imvros:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZFVLLIZsh8A&list=PLsmrGn_1E1...
(the meat in the video is goat, not mutton, but it's the same recipe).
Or, my favourite (and a recipe handed down by my grandfather, though it skipped a generation): Gioulbasi, a whole leg of mutton wrapped in wax paper, with vegetables and melty cheese, and roasted slow and sweet:
https://youtu.be/OZjAiqC3ws0?si=93pwB2DZDNBtgNyF&t=6
Though these days I prefer to be all posh and use a French oven to slow-roast mutton (and lamb, and goat).
Anyway we have lots of Turkish loan words in the Greek language. To the best of my ability to transliterate these examples in latin characters: ati, passoumi, briki (ibrik, I think), kazani, charatsi, tsoglani, bairaki, chatiri, dounias, giouroussi, boulouki, dragoumanos, doulapi, and derti, of course, etc. As you can probably tell, we always tend to add an "-i" at the end.
We also say "halali" and "harami", which we clearly took from the Turkish.
And of course, Tsantirimin Oustoune, and other all time greatest hits:
https://youtu.be/NE9sQGPhYbM?si=q-Sk4Yuo_bxjO10s - By Flery Dandonaki (a great Greek singer)
https://youtu.be/QDzXPLX8JdQ?si=nRx-Lv7GbIjmaeIG - By Rosa Eskenazi (a Jewish Greek singer)
https://youtu.be/GH7TffsisJc?si=l7sGSt5ZdAmug7jb - By Stelios Kazandzidis (a Pontiac Greek singer)
Greece is of the East :)
The most tender part is the backstrap (its marbled like wagyu) and incredibly easy to prepare and skewer. This is followed by the legs. You can even go one step further and skewer more fat inbetween.
Otherwise, pan frying it with basic seasoning is fine.
I grew up on it, and have probably cooked it about ~150 times for other people. It's always been a hit and I'm not exactly a chef ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
No, make it into a pilaf. In a ceramic oven vessel. If you're from the Middle East, or anywhere around the Mediterranean, that's what your heart yearns for, and your heart knows best.
Also, saturated fats but that's not why I brought up your heart :P
The thing that cracks me up are yuppies caring for their cast iron skillet like it’s a newborn baby. “You can’t use soap on it… You can’t treat it like that… To maintain it you must…”
I promise that generations of dirt poor Southerners had bigger things to worry about than following Alton Brown’s directions for cast iron maintenance.
I inherited my pan 20 years ago; it ws in poor shape. I stripped it with caustic soda, and re-seasoned it, which took about a day elapsed. Ever since, it gets washed-up using detergent, and immediately dried. It's as good as when I first seasoned it. I've never had to repair the finish.
It's possible that your grandma has a lot more classical cooking skills than you think. A good bit of "southern cooking" is classical French cooking that's evolved over time and has been adapted for local ingredients.
I don't want to spend my life honing my cookware. I want to toss it in the dishwasher and get on with my precious leisure time.
I use a chainmaille scrubber with dish soap. Works well.
But yeah, the idea that you have to leave the cooking grease and fat on cast iron and aren't allowed to use soap to cut the grease and get it off.... is an odd one.
Maybe I've been playing a bit too much GTNH.
This was long, long before Alton Brown was a thing.
“Mapp had inherited her grandmother’s skillet and used it often. It had a glassy black surface that no soap ever touched. Starling put it in front of her on the table.”
I read the series long after publication date and remembered going, “wait, the no soap thing has been around THAT long?”
Some people are stuck in their ways, never really understood why they shouldn't use soap in the first place, or didn't notice that the soap they grew up with is different from today's dish detergents... I think there's a lesson to be learned here about re-evaluating our assumptions every so often and not doing things just because that's how they've always been done.
While I will not pretend to know all the reasons in fact that this practice has reached such common use, washing your cast iron pan with soap won't strip the seasoning that is already set, but it will strip all of the unset oils left over from cooking that are on the surface. If you spend tons of time maintaining cast irons, you will find that the single most important practice to building a smooth surface that never sticks is leaving a thin (towel dry / buffed, leave too much and it turns sticky) film of oil on the surface of the pan after every use. If you need to or want to use soap to remove the (again, unset non-seasoning) layer of oil on the surface, you can dry off the pan, add some oil and buff it with a towel before storing. Using some heat during this process, but not smoking the oil is necessary to expand the pores of the pan (or make the oil more viscous and better fill the static surface of the pan, whichever mental model helps you sleep). This process takes extra time and effort to achieve the effect you already have with a well seasoned cast iron after cooking: Food debris washes right off with some light scrubbing and water, leaving a clean surface with a thin layer of oil on the top that has nicely filled all the cracks on the surface.
I figure this is probably what those "dirt poor southerns" were doing too, since it's simple and effective.
Scrape-and-wipe is about 90% of my cast iron "cleaning". I only take it to the sink occasionally.
If I still used stainless steel, you bet I'd be soaking them overnight then scrubbing the hell out of them in the sink the next morning.
I have multiple cast iron items in my kitchen that I can wash with washing-up liquid, gently scour with wire wool even (sure, too much vigour would probably start to remove it, or at very least scratch up the surface and make it harder to clean/things stick more) with no problem or loss of seasoning.
https://altonbrown.com/how-to-care-for-cast-iron/
Some misconceptions do exist, for example dish soap not usually being a detergent that damages the patina nowadays. While other practices are a development, like our general food hygiene standards having changed significantly, and keeping a patina on cookware therefore requiring more deliberate attention.
lamb is very popular in Italy and there are no "no old ways" to cook it.
Not a fan of it, but it's probably one of the most untouched traditional food you can find here.
The reason for having two words for this is closely tied to the fact that cooking them is completely different.
Lamb doesn’t take a bunch of specialized skill.
Maybe I'm just Italian, but if you just toss a lamb/mutton shank into your otherwise boring red sauce (which you were already cooking low and slow, right?) it goes a long way.
Hold on, are we talking about lamb or mutton?
Lamb is extremely forgiving. It's tender and has plenty of flavor. It's fine to cook lamb hot and fast like a steak, or low and slow like basically any meat. If you treat lamb like oddly shaped beef or pork you'll be fine.
Mutton is not forgiving, needs to be treated like its own unique thing, and braising it should be your first instinct. If that's what you meant and it was just a typo, I totally agree with you.
I'd argue it's more a matter of degrees. Chicken is more forgiving than beef, beef more than lamb, etc. Lamb is far from "extremely" forgiving - it's just moreso than mutton.
> Mutton is not forgiving, needs to be treated like its own unique thing, and braising it should be your first instinct. If that's what you meant and it was just a typo, I totally agree with you.
That's all true of lamb too, just not to anywhere near the same extent as mutton.
For breast, the trick is to pound it to ~3/4 inch thickness and then dry brine for at least 30 minutes. So much easier to get it evenly cooked and tender all the way through:
https://www.seriouseats.com/the-best-juicy-grilled-boneless-...
In Fiji only lamb neck is that cheap.
Lamb/mutton tagines are incredibly easy to make. They’re basically “throw it into a slow cooker and come back eight hours later” dishes. You can improve the flavor by browning, but the simplest versions are still wonderfully delicious and basically idiot proof.
Well cooked lamb is so delicious it - in my opinion should be eaten only with gravy or a tiny dab of mustard or tiny dab of mint sauce.
For instance I love fish curries but can’t stand regular roasted/steamed fish lightly flavored with salt, dill, butter etc.
Yet the comments section is full of people treating them interchangeably, replying to someone who talked about mutton by talking about lamb, or vice versa, or talking about "lamb/mutton". I'm not sure if the commentors disagree with the OP and think it's over-stating the difference? Or just aren't really paying attention.
I (who live in the USA) have had plenty of lamb, but have never had mutton. So I can't say from personal experience.
But this is one of those HN articles where the comments section seems entirely divorced from the article.
For instance: https://www.oregonhistoryproject.org/articles/historical-rec...