Thursday, November 12, 2009

Picture a Day - Day 345

I hope everyone had a much better Veterans Day than I did.

Previous post should explain some as well as the fact that I am into Defcon level three of my illness which means all that protective mucus my body built up in my lungs is now trying to escape through a series of body racking coughs and always at night.

And what a perfect segue from sputtering coughs to tasty food.

Over the weekend we made one of our bi-yearly adventures to Sams Club, and all without becoming horribly lost and resorting to eating our shoes somewhere around the giant piles of plastic silverware. We made it out with a few giant boxes of food stuffs that we don't see much elsewhere or were able to trick ourselves into thinking we were getting a good deal.

One such "deal" was a leg of lamb deboned and tied up in a roast.

While we have made lamb before it was in chop form and much easier to think of what to do (when in doubt, marinate and grill is my motto).

So I relied on a very simple and easy to make recipe that seems fancier than it really is.

First step is to chop up a couple bulbs of garlic. I always use the back of my knife and push down til I hear a little crack. Then the garlic paper all but falls off with a little nudging. So much faster.
Just slice the garlic into slivers. Don't worry you'll find out why later (or you could cheat and scroll to the end of the post, but you'd never do that. Cheating is wrong and hey get back here!).
Take a whole bunch of your favorite spices and mix them all together. I went with a more typical greek mix of oregano, rosemary, basil and for the hell of it tossed in a bay leaf or two.
Okay, now it's time to pull your leg of lamb out of the fridge and get it into a pan.

Don't worry, I'll wait.

What's a five letter word for making people wait because you're out of ideas?

Got it? Now just take out your paring knife . . . well go get that then, shesh . . . and cut some slits into your leg of lamb.
It can be either boneless or still have the bone in for this recipe, doesn't matter a bit. Though a lack of bone makes stabbing a lot easier.

Drizzle some lemon juice over the roast trying to work it into the slits a bit. Lamb and Lemon go together like McDonalds and frivolous lawsuits.
Time to find out why you slivered the garlic instead of randomly chopping it into little bits. See I knew you could be patient and oh you already figured it out. Well uh . . . the next step is to slide the garlic into the slits.

There will be quite a bit of manhandling but that's okay, the more you crush garlic the tastier it gets.
Now just rub your spice mix all over the roast.
Just pop this baby into a 325 degree oven for 1 and a half to 2 hours. I used my magical digital meat thermometer (that sucker is awesome and I'd never cook without it, if you don't have one go and get one now) and waited til it got around 145 before pulling it and letting it rest.

A little garnish of mashed potatoes and some gravy and voila fancy roast meal of lamb.
Have you had a lot of lamb or made it before? What's your favorite way to prepare it?

I've never been able to wrap my mind around the mint jelly idea but uh I may be willing to try it if someone else says that's tasty.

The funniest thing about this whole post, I don't even like roast very much. But it makes my husband happy and it isn't all that bad of a torture. There are worse ways to die than by meat and potatoes.

3 comments:

Linda said...

Awesome. That looks really easy. I'll try it when I find a good deal on lamb.

Chesney said...

Can't believe you are making meals like that when you feel as crappy as you do, I am in awe!!! :)

Read and See said...

Lamb is my absolute favourite meat. I would have it once a week if it wasn't so bloody expensive (don't know about the USA, but here it's like double the price of beef or pork). ALWAYS have it on Christmas, though! I don't do much to it, really. I wrap it up tight in some tinfoil with a sprig or two of rosemary, and cook it sloooowly. That keeps the juices in. When it's started looking like it's halfway between raw and cooked (I'm so technical) I let a little of the juice out of the tinfoil into the roasting pan, and pop some potatoes in there. Only when it's nearly done (ie you can get a fork in and out quite happily) do I remove the tinfoil and let it cook in there with the potatoes. I wouldn't leave it exposed for longer than 20 minutes, unless you love the hard bits on the outside like my Dad does. Oh, you can also roast some butternut or pumpkin in there with the potatoes. Or carrots.

Slice and serve DOUSED in mint sauce. Roast potatoes should always be swimming in mint sauce. I never put gravy on lamb. Mint all the way, baby!

NOM NOM NOM.