Like the previous recipe, this one also pairs up lamb with some heat and punchy flavours. The harissa loses some of it’s heat in the cooking, and creates a lovely tangy, spicy, sticky crust on the lamb. I got my hands on a fine leg of Yorkshire lamb from my new favourite meat source, Marky Market. It’s a great idea. Mark gets up every day to go to Smithfields and Billingsgate, you place your order the day before, and then he delivers to your door. Brilliant.

In terms of prep time, the potatoes are a bit of a faff, but the lamb is simplicity itself, so it’s swings and roundabouts. We served it with a gorgeous heritage tomato, red onion and mint salad, and a tzatziki (you can find the recipe for the latter here).

Ingredients

(for the lamb)

2.5 kg leg of lamb

90g Harissa paste

90g 0% fat Greek yoghurt

Juice and zest of one lemon

(for the potatoes)

1.7 kg of potatoes (Desiree / King Edward)

1 white onion

1 red onion

1 Bay leaf

2 sprigs of thyme

Salt & pepper

750 ml lamb stock (you can also use chicken or veg stock)

50 g butter

Method

You want the lamb to marinate in the harissa overnight, so your first job is to prep the leg. Making the marinade is easy. Just mix the yoghurt, Harissa, lemon juice and zest together.

Next, taking a sharp knife, cross-hatch the lamb, cutting into the flesh around half to a centimeter deep. Now, using a spatula, smother the lamb all over with the marinade, working it into the cuts, then pop it in a large freezer bag and leave it in the fridge overnight.

NB. You want the lamb to be at room temperature before you cook it, so make sure you take it out of the fridge a couple of hours before you put it in the oven.

The following day, set your oven to 245c and then prep the boulangère. For the best results, and to save time, slice the potatoes with a mandolin, but watch your fingers! First, peel your spuds, and then slice them with the mandolin, or as thinly as you can (around 3mm thick). When you’ve done this, plunge them into cold water and rinse to get some of the starch out, then turn  out onto a tea towel, and pat dry with another.

Next chop and slice the two onions, and fry them until they are golden brown. This will make the finished dish sweeter and richer. Now butter a large baking dish and start putting it all together. Start with a couple of layers of potatoes, then scatter over some of the onion, thyme, bay and seasoning. Repeat until you are out of potatoes and onion.

Now pour the stock over the potatoes (it should come up just below the top later of spuds) and then finish the dish with a sprinkling of salt and pepper, some sprigs of thyme, and a few  nobs of butter. Set aside and cover with a cartouche of greaseproof paper.

When your oven is up to temperature, put your lamb in a roasting tray with a rack, and then put it in the oven. You’re going to cook it at 245c for around half an hour, before turning the oven down to 200c and cooking it for a further hour and a half.

After the first half hour, and the oven has been turned down, put the potatoes in, keeping them covered with the cartouche. After 45 minutes, remove the cartouche so that the top of the boulangère can brown up nicely.

When the lamb has cooked for 2 hours, remove from the oven, set on a serving plate and cover with foil to rest for quarter of an hour. Then turn off the oven, leaving the potatoes inside to keep them hot.

Serve after the lamb has rested with the tomato salad, and a tzatziki.

As mentioned in the previous post, I was down in Cornwall for Christmas. My mum always puts on a great spread while we’re down there, but with seven mouths to feed she has her work cut out, and seems to spend too much time in the kitchen. That being the case, for the last few years I’ve given her the night off and cooked a meal for the family.

This year I cooked a slow cooked shoulder of lamb with Cornish style boulangère potatoes and spring greens. The lamb is cooked in a tangy herb, lemon and anchovy marinade (I have to leave out the garlic as my dad can’t stand it, but have included it in this recipe), and the classicly French boulangère are given a South West twist with the adition of Cornish cruncher cheddar cheese.

Ingredients

For the lamb:

2.5 kilo shoulder of lamb

2 lemons (juice and zest)

10 -15 tinned anchovy fillets

Bunch of rosemary

5 large cloves of garlic

Olive oil

Freshly ground black pepper

For the potatoes:

1.5 kilos of potatoes

2 onions

200g Cornish cruncher or other mature cheddar

Fresh ground black pepper

300ml vegetable stock

100ml milk

Chopped rosemary

Salt

Freshly ground black pepper

Butter

For the greens:

5 heads of spring greens

Butter

Salt

Freshly ground black pepper

Method

First of all, get your oven as hot as it will go, then prepare the marinade for the lamb. Finely chop the garlic, rosmary and anchovy fillets, zest and juice the two lemons, add a good couple of glugs of olive oil, then season with black pepper and mix well. Next, score the lamb all over on the upper side in a diamond formation about 1/2 a centimeter deep, and place in a roasting tray resting on slices of the zested and juiced lemons. Then spoon over the marinade, making sure you work it into the slashes on the shoulder.

When the oven is good an hot, slam in the lamb. You’re going to cook it fiercely for around 30 minutes to form a kind of marinated crust on the skin, and they you’re going to turn the oven down to around 180°C and cover the roasting tray tightly with tin foil and cook for a further 3 hours.

Now prepare the potatoes. Peel then slice the spuds as thinly as you can. I used a mandolin, but if you don’t have one, try to get them about a 3mm thick. When you’ve done this, plunge them into cold water and rinse to get some of the starch out, then turn  out onto a tea towel, and pat dry with another.

Next chop and slice the two onions, and fry them until they are golden brown. This will make the finished dish sweeter and richer. Now butter a large baking dish and start putting it all together. Start with a couple of layers of potatoes, then scatter over some of the onion, cheese and rosemary. Season with salt and pepper and then repeat until you are out of potatoes. Make sure you have some cheese and rosemary left over, but don’t scatter it over the top yet. Mix the stock and milk together, and pour over the top. The liquid should come around 3/4 of the way up the dish. Next cover the potatoes with a sheet of grease proof paper.

When the lamb has about an hour and a half to go, put in the potatoes and cook for an hour with the paper on, then remove from the oven. Take off the paper, scatter the remaining cheese and rosemary on top, season generously with black pepper then and put back into the oven for the last half hour until bubbling and golden brown.

Prepare the greens by slicing into fat strips and discarding the fat ends of the stalk. Boil in salted water until tender, drain, add a good nob of butter and season with salt and pepper.

Serve with the lamb and potatoes. Praaaper jaaaab.