Roast leg of lamb was a typical New Year’s Day dinner, growing up. Over the years it evolved from Amma‘s lamb pot roast to more elaborate creations by my older sister. Lamb roast recipes which included the use of red wine both in cooking the lamb itself and in making poached pears for dessert. This New Year‘s Day I am opting for seafood (oven-baked prawns and squid) for a light end to an extraordinary annus horribilis. Horrible the year may have been in changing the way we live, I for one am grateful and glad to have had time with my family, good health and the opportunity to write this blog again. Back to that roast recipe. This Christmas I made leg of lamb with rosemary, garlic and lemon, a change from my usual mint and garlic lamb. I am fond of using these flavour combinations for making roast chicken, it was my first attempt at rosemary lamb. Rosemary is apart of the mint family Lamiaceae, along with basil, oregano and thyme which make it a worthy complement to lamb meat. I combined rosemary with lemon and garlic. Lemon to help tenderize the meat and garlic for its ever-faithful flavour contribution to any dish. I used a rather large portion of lamb, slow cooked over four hours with noteworthy results, succulent, delectable lamb.
How To Make Leg of Lamb with Rosemary Garlic and Lemon
There are two ways of making this dish. One is to combine the rosemary, garlic and lemon juice with butter then stuff into the meat. The other is to use whole ingredients. I opted for the latter. I stuffed slivers of garlic onto the meat then tied slices of lemon and whole rosemary around the leg.
The woody smell of rosemary, when baked in the oven, gives added
flavour to this dish. I also added garlic halves in the baking tray. I
used minimal oil, allowing the meat to slow cook in its fat.
I added
root vegetables after the lamb had been in the oven for 2.5 hours. This
prevents the vegetables from overcooking and allows then to cook in the
extracted juices from the meat.
Lamb with Rosemary Garlic and Lemon Recipe
Leg of Lamb with Rosemary Garlic and Lemon
10
10 Min
4 H & 30 M
3 H & 40 M
Ingredients
- leg of lamb (I used 4 kg)
- 1 whole garlic bulb
- 4 cloves garlic to be cut into slivers
- 6 rosemary stalks
- 2 lemons
- salt
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- ½ teaspoon crushed black pepper
- cooking string
- Root vegetables of choice. I used potatoes, sweet potatoes, carrots and red onion
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- salt and black pepper
- 1 medium potato
- 1 cup water
- 1/2 cup of excess liquid from the roast
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 150 degrees Celsius
- Trim the lamb off excessive fat
- Cover with salt and crushed black pepper, rub into the meat
- Stick a small knife into the meat to make slits for inserting the garlic slivers (from the four cloves of garlic).
- Place the lemon slices and rosemary around the lamb. Tie with cooking string.
- Cut garlic bulb into half. Place in a tray with lamb leg.
- Drizzle with olive oil.
- Place in the oven.
- Bake for 2.5 hours, baste the roast very 20 minutes or so using the extracted liquid form the roast itself.
- Remove from oven. Spoon liquid from the tray over the roast.
- Remove excess liquid from oven tray for making the gravy.
- Add cut root vegetables into baking pan. Pour some of the juice over the meat and roast vegetables.
- Place in the oven. Bake until the potatoes are slightly brown (at least 30 minutes).
- While the roast is in the oven, prepare the gravy. Add excess liquid from the roast to a saucepan, add a grated potato then cool until it thickens. Add water to achieve the desired consistency.
- Remove roast from oven, serve warm with gravy. Enjoy!
Calories
236.87
Fat (grams)
13.23
Sat. Fat (grams)
3.84
Carbs (grams)
16.43
Fiber (grams)
3.11
Net carbs
13.32
Sugar (grams)
2.77
Protein (grams)
13.73
Sodium (milligrams)
178.6
Cholesterol (grams)
45.59
