[Artemisia] Lamb recipe???

[Oogie McGuire]

>Just gifted with a haunch of lamb.   Anyone out there have any good 
>lamb recipes?  Roast (if that's do-able), stew, whatever - period or 
>not, just good - I have lots of Middle Eastern spices on hand, just 
>not not familiar with cooking with lamb at all - any help would be 
>appreciated!

oo ooo oo as a shepherd I eat a lot of lamb and mutton. <G> Our 
favorite is our mutton as the lamb is too mild for my taste.

A few key facts, most US lamb will be fattier than the sheep I raise 
so you may need to adjust cooking method to render more fat out. Lamb 
and mutton is best served medium to rare, overcooked it can get 
tough, esp. mutton. If you have tough meat then a long slow cooking 
is best. Different muscles will have different flavors, much like 
different cuts of beef have different flavors but the differences are 
much more pronounced in sheep meats. Different breeds of sheep will 
have *very* different flavored meat so it helps to know what breed 
you got as that affects the spices I would recommend.

I have a few recipes for lamb/mutton on my website, under our personal section.

Other favorites include:

leg sliced into round steaks, broiled or BBQ with garlic and pepper 
on it. Or use one of Penzey's spice blends,

<http://www.penzeys.com/>

I like their lamb spice, Sunny Spain and sate for lamb. I also like 
all of their curry and vindaloo spice mixes.

lamb sate, look for any good recipe and serve with a peanut dipping 
sauce and basmati rice

Mutton slow roast, brown a diced onion and several cloves of garlic 
(remember garlic is a vegetable not a spice <G>) in peanut oil in a 
heavy duty dutch oven. Brown a shoulder roast or other flavorful 
mutton roast. Add several cups of a decent red wine, either a pinot, 
syrah or zin (if it's not good enough to drink it's not good enough 
to cook with) and bake in a 200-250 degree oven (at sea level) or a 
300-350 degree oven (at 6500 ft) for several hours. Replenish the 
wine as necessary or use a bit of water. About 1 hour before serving 
add carrots, potatoes, pepper, herbs de provence (savory, rosemary, 
fennel, thyme, basil, tarragon, lavender, and marjoram) Serve with 
fresh crusty bread and more of the same wine you used to cook it. 
This also works with a nice dark english ale or a smoked porter.

rogan josh is great with stew meats served over noodles or rice

Balti mix is good for chops as a sprinkle and serve with pita or 
other flat breads

of course curry is great, you can cube larger cuts to make it like a 
curry stir fry.

cardomom spice is great for a flowery flavor for quick cooked items, 
long cooking changes the flavor, still good but different.

Ground lamb I use in place of hamburger for taco's (I add more cumin 
and coriander to my chile powder mixes when I am using sheep meat.)

Lamb made into polish sausage with lots of garlic is great grilled

Lamb bratwurst is pretty good but needs a dark beer to accompany it 
for best results ;-)

Lamb Italian sausage, made into links  and then fried and sliced is a 
much better meat for spaghetti sauce than beef, a milder flavor and 
really nice with a hearty red wine or chianti.

That's all I can think of off the top of my head. In general use lamb 
like you would any rich lean flavorful beef or like you would elk or 
venison.

Hope that helps <G>
-- 
Oogie McGuire - oogiem at desertweyr.com
Weyr Associates - Multimedia and Web Authoring Services & Consulting
Desert Weyr - CMK Arabian horses and Black Welsh Mountain Sheep
http://www.desertweyr.com/ 
Paonia, CO USA
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