This shoulder of lamb is slow-cooked with seasonal vegetables until beautifully tender, and served with home-made mint sauce.
Ingredients
- Olive oil
- 2 carrots, peeled and thickly sliced
- 2 leeks, thickly sliced
- 4 cloves of garlic, skin on
- A couple of sprigs of thyme
- 1 shoulder of lamb, boned and cut into 4 cm pieces
- 300 ml10½ fl oz Madeira
- 300 ml10½ fl oz white wine
- 12 new potatoes, peeled
- 800 ml28¼ fl oz chicken stock
- Sea salt and black pepper
- bunch mint
- 1 tbsp caster sugar
- 50 ml1¾ fl oz white wine vinegar
Method: How to make Slow cooked shoulder of lamb
Preheat the oven to 170C/gas mark 3.
Heat a little olive oil in a casserole dish. Add the carrots and leeks and fry for 4-5 minutes, until starting to colour. Add the whole garlic cloves, thyme and bay leaf.
In a separate pan, brown the pieces of lamb in olive oil until lovely and caramelised. Remove from the pan with a slotted spoon and add into the vegetables. Drain a little of the flavoursome fat from the meat pan into the casserole dish, then discard the remaining fat.
Place the frying pan back on the heat then pour in the Madeira. Allow this to bubble up and reduce down, deglazing the pan as it does so. Add this into the vegetables, then repeat the process with the white wine.
Add the potatoes to the casserole dish, then pour over the chicken stock (this should just cover the contents of the pan). Season well, cover with a lid and bake for 1 ½ - 2 hrs, until the lamb is tender.
Meanwhile, make the mint sauce. Grind up the mint leaves with the sugar. Add the white wine vinegar, then set aside until serving.
