I would try it but I have never seen it. Even living in a major metro area, I have no idea how I would go about finding any mutton. I know stores that sell exotic meat that includes alligator, wild boar, rattlesnake, and ostrich but I have never seen mutton let alone eaten any.
It really isn’t even relevant here. Putting mutton on your spit and eating said mutton are two entirely different realms of endeavor.
ETA: Oh, and for relevancy’s sake I’ve never had mutton, though I’ve had plenty of lamb, kid and adult goat.
Any Indian, Pakistani, Middle Eastern markets around? That’s where I’d start looking. Plenty of Indian restaurants here in Chicago serve mutton and you’re sure to find some in the grocery stores along Devon St. (the main Subcontinental strip in Chicago). I’m also 99% sure I’ve seen it in Middle Eastern butchers. Also, I have heard that a lot of meat that is sold as “chivo” (goat) here in Mexican markets is actually mutton.
That’s a funny thought, since the markets I’ve seen here sell borrego (mutton) as well as chivo. It would be a riot if both were actually the same meat with different labels. 
I’d imagine if they make the distinction in the market, it’s properly labeled (at least I’d hope so.) I was pretty surprised to here that a lot of “chivo” in Chicago is mutton, but the information comes from a Mexican butcher who presumably would know better about these things than I do.
There’s a butcher up here in Arlington Heights (may actually be Buffalo Grove) who has mutton (two, actually, Grove and Dorfler’s). I’ve had mutton chops, and they reminded me of lamb-flavored oxtails.
Pretty good, but give me a plate of lambchops…I’m feelin’ fine, the immaturity be damned.
-Cem
Comparing a mutton lettuce & tomato with true love perhaps.
Lust4Life is clearly not experience enough, because it’s certainly not unknown in the UK, although admittedly nowhere near the ubiquity of lamb.
It is? New to me!
I never tried lamb until my late 20s, but I really like it, and now I crave it sometimes. It’s a good change of pace from the usual beef/pork/chicken triangle. I’ve never tried mutton but I’d like to, unfortunately I’ve never seen it for sale, even in stores that have more exotic meats like Central Market.
My dad had mutton when he was in England in the 50s, and said it was wonderful. However, when I asked a British waiter (I think it was in Simpsons-in-the-Strand) about it in the 80s, he said that most of the time when you see mutton on the menu, it’s really lamb. I don’t know if that’s really true, but it’s what he told me.
Attitudes to meat, in places that actually take any interest in what they’re serving (not necessarily expensive places), have changed a huge amount since then.
You can’t get mutton here in Hawaii!
That is to say, not in the supermarkets. :o
An impression, perhaps mistaken, that I’ve picked up from British literature here and there.
From The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus, by Christopher Marlowe – the scene where Faustus is introduced to the Seven Deadly Sins:
(By memory) – from Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley: Two of Bernard Marx’ cow-orkers are talking about how “pneumatic” a girl they know is and Marx broods and mutters to himself that they are talking about her as if she were “mutton, so much mutton.”
From a dimly remembered Freaky Fables strip by J.B. Handelsman (used to run in Punch magazine): A man is preparing to ride off as a refugee from an approaching army of Serbs or perhaps Croats (it’s mentioned that you can tell the difference because the Serbians use Cyrillic letters). He can’t persuade his perplexed wife to come along. Last panel, he rides home. His wife is visibly pregnant.
HUSBAND: How did it go? Did the Serbians steal the cattle?
WIFE: They didn’t want beef. They wanted mutton.
HUSBAND: Did they use Cyrillic letters?
WIFE: Not even French ones.
BTW: Lamb is traditionally served with mint sauce – what goes best on mutton? Gravy, mint sauce, or what?
Is that more like a British pork pie (served cold), or a pot pie (served hot, with a crust on top and veggies and gravy inside), or something that bears no resemblance to either?
As pointed out in this thread, there is some sheep ranching in the U.S, especially in New Mexico. And sheep don’t live forever. Yet we can’t seem to find any part of their carcasses in the supermarket. So, what is done with them when they get old? Do they go for dogfood, or what?
Maybe it’s obvious to everyone, but then again maybe not. “French letters” is a slang term for condoms, something the pregnant wife obviously knew.
Inspired by this thread, and with sufficient reasion to be in midtown in midweek (heh), I went over to Keen’s again and had another mutton chop. Mmmmm.
The cuts of meat they tend to bring you verge on the ridiculously thick. Like > 3 inches. Exaggeate the doneness of your entree unless you really like bloody cool raw centered chops.
(Me, barbarian than I am, I like the last vestiges of pink to be only very very faintly present at the core, supplanted with light brown elsewhere. NO freaking red., anywhere. My distant ancestors discovered fire and found that food cooked upon it was better. I agree with them. Cook my food)
For appetizer, the Maryland crab cakes are nice. Moist and flaky. Tangy salad (?vinegared narrow-cut cabbage like a cross between fresh cole slaw and sauerkraut?).
They’ve got white asparagus. Delectable.
Back to the sheep. Usually there are some outside cuts, crunchy on the outside, fatty later + very well done mutton within, Mmmmmmm. Like cracklin’s. Salty-tangy-yummy.
More like a pot pie, as it’s served hot. McGregor’s Mutton Pie
That is why I added the caveat “in my experience”,actually I’ve never even seen it on sale let alone meet anyone who’s eaten it (outside of a “meat” takeaway curry that is.)
Though I do know that when the retail market wasn’t so finickity some decades ago mutton was a quite common British dish.