Recipes
- Apple and Blackberry Shortcake
- Drunken Brown Sugar Bananas
- Four Hour Olive and Lemon Scented Leg of Lamb
- Gorgeously Simple Broad Bean and Parmesan Salad
- Grilled Lemon Whiting with Crushed Peas
- Honey Roasted Figs with Butterscotch Sauce
- Just Yummy Peas
- Lemon Delicious
- Melting Moments
- Pecan and Golden Syrup Tart
- Polpette - Italian Style Pork, Veal and Sage Meatballs
- Real Shepherd's Pie
- Soft Polenta with Braised Mushroom Ragu
- Spaghetti with Pork, Fennel and Tomato
- Tuscan Style Slow Braised Beans with Red Wine and Sage
- Up-the-Duff (Tinny Impaled, Beer Steamed) Chook
- Wheat Beer Sozzled Pork Spare Ribs with Sage and Garlic
- Yoghurt Cake with Lemon Syrup
Four Hour Olive and Lemon Scented Leg of Lamb
1 July 2008
Long time no see. The pot roast came and went and came again. Like oven bags, it’s still part of many people’s way of cooking. Pot-roasting keeps things tender and moist, and holds in all the flavour. To celebrate the slow weekend, I’ve used a whole leg of lamb, though you could try shoulder too.
Four Hour Olive and Lemon Scented Leg of Lamb
(serves 4-6)
You could use the same paste on a roast, but this tastes even better if you’ve got the time.
1 medium sized leg of lamb
about 10 fleshy black olives, pitted
about 6 cloves garlic, peeled
3-4 slices lemon
3 bay leaves
1/2 onion, diced
125 ml (1/2 cup) red wine
Cooking time: The clue is in the recipe name
Preheat the oven to 150C. Take the lamb from the fridge about 1/2 an hour prior to cooking, if possible. Blend or pound the olives with the garlic until a coarse paste is formed, adding a little water if necessary. Smear the lamb all over, particularly the fleshy bit that will face upwards. Place in a large sealable pot (you can use a tray and foil, or even an oven bag, but a pot is best). Lay the lemon slices over the lamb, and the bay leaves. Put the onion, red wine and 125 ml (1/2 cup) water in the base of the pan and season the leg well with salt and pepper. Don’t forget, however, that the olives will probably already be salty. Put the lid on, pop in the oven, turn down to about 110C and cook for 3-4 hours, checking on occasion that the pan hasn’t dried out. Add a splash more water if it does. It should get more juices that drip from the lamb. Serve the very tender meat with baked potatoes in their jackets and a bowl full of peas.