Was reading up different recipes for Tagines and came across this statement regards mutton.

Wasn’t an Aussie website.  I often wonder at the size of some of the cuts that I get for lamb if it is actually real lamb.


Quote:

Tagines are Moroccan slow-cooked meat, fruit and vegetable dishes which are almost invariably made with mutton. Using lamb cuts down the cooking time, but if you can find good hogget (older than lamb, younger than mutton, commonly labeled 'baking legs' and sold cheaply) that will do very well.

I get lots of "lamb" from my dad, but reading this, I guess it would be hogget. He used to leave them longer till they would definitely fall in the mutton category, but he uses them for breeding now and takes the young adults

In Oz, there are definitions for lamb, hogget and mutton.  IIRC MLA (Meat and Livestock Australia) came up with them.  It;s based around the number of teeth.

Well technically it is the age but that is measured by how many teeth they have.  Of course this was before the NLIS system tracked each beast from birth to abattoir.

Page 3 of this lays it out:
https://www.mla.com.au/globalassets/mla-corporate/extensions-training-and-tools/documents/assessmentmanual-sheep.pdf

It is hard to get anything other than lamb in Oz as the market wants lamb and it is more lucrative to send to older beasts overseas where they pay top dollar for the tastier meat.

I collect old cookbooks and many of the recipes call for mutton which as you say is very hard to find.

Rob.