We should eat much more Mutton
Mutton is delicious and one of our most sustainable meats. Sustainable because sheep graze and improve soils and only consumer 2% of all the grain consumed by UK animals. (13m tonnes last year more here).
Mutton is meat from a sheep that is 3 years old or more and taste and texture vary with the breed, hanging and cooking. Some connoisseurs prize the lean Herdwick others one of the many varieties of sheep favoured to suit climate or type of land, such as moors, highlands, or salt marsh.
Age tends to improve flavour but can effect texture and most cooks recommend that a carcass should be hung for 2 weeks and the meat slow cooked. A leg of mutton for instance should be put in a hot oven for an hour then turned right down to 100 degrees and left for 8-10 hours.
To get the best mutton buy direct from the farmer through BigBarn or ask your local butcher.
Did you know that on average a supermarket will use around 500 plastic cartons to sell all the cuts from a whole beef carcass, compared to zero at the average butcher!