Over the last few years, our family has become a bit of a fan of lamb. We don’t have it very often because it is on the pricey side, but when we do have it, we’re all so happy. The thing is though, up until yesterday, we’ve only ever had lamb done on the grill- or over a fire when camping. I’ve never cooked it in the house, and decided it was time to remedy that.
I had picked up a boneless leg of lamb late last fall from Sam’s club and it’s been sitting in the freezer ever since, just waiting for a reason to cook it up. ( We have had very good luck with the lamb from Sam’s by the way, since often times, that’s the only place around here to really find it if you don’t want a whole lamb.) Earlier this month, I looked at the calendar, and decided that Passover week was the perfect time to cook up some lamb. Then last week, we all came down with a yucky bug of some kind. The last five days or so have been a bit of a hodge-podge when it comes to cookery, but I determined that Tuesday would be the best day for the lamb, because it’s the only day of the week we don’t go anywhere. So I pulled it out to thaw on Monday, and then woke up Tuesday feeling the worst I have in the five days I’ve not been well. I determined I was going to cook it up anyway and we were going to have a delightful modified Passover feast.
The first thing I needed was a rub of some kind. I reached into my bag of tricks, and the first thing that came to mind was a classic Greek preparation including lemon, parsley and garlic. I also added salt, pepper, herbes de provence and some real balsamic vinegar. Oh boy, if you could smell this… keep in mind, my sniffer wasn’t working at all yesterday, and it still smelled incredible.
I needed to rub this mixture into the lamb and give it some time to marinate. I also wanted to get into the insides of this leg that had been rolled up, yet, I wanted it to stay intact as a roast when it went in the oven. See, here’s the rolled leg, packed into netting, and it even has a button timer to tell me when it is done.
So what I did was, I worked with one end of the roast at a time, and I gently pulled up the netting about halfway up the roast. Then I used my hands to smear some herb mixture on the inside of the leg. I pulled the netting back down, and then flipped the roast over and did the same thing to the other side. With what mixture was left, I thoroughly massaged the outside of the roast until I’d used every last bit of it. I set it in the roasting pan, and let it sit at room temperature for a full hour to absorb all that flavor. I suspect this part could be done well ahead of time and refrigerated until needed.
Then I took an onion, diced half and sliced half, diced one celery stalk and diced one carrot. To those I added four red potatoes that had been well scrubbed and cut into chunks. I seasoned the veggies with salt, pepper and oil, and then nestled them into the roasting pan around the roast. Then I popped it into a 425ºF oven for 30 minutes. At the 30 minute mark, I turned the temperature down to 350ºF and set my timer for an hour.
An hour later, the button still hadn’t popped, and when I used a probe thermometer, I thought it seemed awfully cool and the juices were quite bloody yet. So I turned up the temperature to 375º and gave it another 15 minutes. It still wasn’t done, so I set it for another 15, and in retrospect, I should have pulled it out to rest. It was a little on the done side. Perfect for someone who wants their lamb medium well to well, but I prefer my lamb to be pink.
Overall though, it was so delicious! None of us cared for the veggies roasted in the lamb fat, by the way, but the lamb itself was so flavorful and it worked really, really well. Andy was very happy to slice up the leftovers to use for sandwiches this week. He did think that the lemon may have been just a touch overpowering at first, but then later when I asked about the seasoning he thought it was ideal. It really was wonderful, and I’m so glad we decided to try our hand at roasting lamb.
Easy Roasted Leg of Lamb
1 4-pound boneless leg of lamb 3-4 cloves garlic, minced 1/2 cup fresh parsley, chopped 1 1/2 teaspoons salt 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper 1 teaspoon dried herbes de provencezest of 1 lemon juice of 1 lemon (scant 1/4 cup) 1 teaspoon REAL balsamic vinegar* 1 tablespoon olive oil 1 celery stalk, chopped 1 carrot, chopped 1 onion, half diced, half sliced
Combine the garlic through the vinegar in a small mixing bowl. Mix well to combine.
Smear the mixture all over the leg of lamb, working it into the inside of the leg as well. If your leg comes wrapped in netting, gently move the netting out of the way to get to the interior of the roll. Replace the netting before rubbing the outside. Rub any remaining mixture all over the outside of the lamb. Let rest for 1 hour at room temperature.
At this point, the lamb can be refrigerated for several hours until needed.
Preheat oven to 425ºF. Drizzle the lamb with the olive oil. Combine the celery, carrot and onion and scatter in the pan around the lamb. Pop in the oven and roast for 30 minutes.
Reduce the temperature to 350ºF and roast for another hour. After the hour has passed, check you lamb. If it has a button, if it hasn’t popped, it will need more cook time. If it doesn’t have a button, use a thermometer. You are looking for 155ºF for a medium well roast. If more cook time is needed, bump up the temperature to 375ºF to give a nice crust to the exterior of the lamb.
Allow the lamb to rest for at least five minutes before slicing. Serve immediately or, it can also be served at room temperature.