Sleek-Jet
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Sep 20, 2007
- Messages
- 12,763
- Reaction score
- 15,478
This is a long tradition in my wife's family and now ours, we have leg of lamb for dinner on Christmas. It is pretty easy to prepare, and in all honesty I prefer this to the standing rib roast we do on Thanksgiving. There's a million different ways to prepare these cuts and lamb is pretty forgiving on technique.
We start with a half leg, de-boned. right off the bat that creates a little controversy, losing the bone takes away some flavor, but I'm lazy and it is easier to carve at the end. I've fixed these both bone in and boneless and I can't really tell the difference. This is about 5 lbs of meat before trimming. A full leg is 10 lbs. A half feeds my family of 4 with plenty of leftovers for sandwiches. And damn, lamb sandwiches or outstanding.
The butcher de-boned the leg and then trusses it up, I pull off the twine and set it aside, I'll use it later. Then I trim all of the fat cap off the leg. This again is a choice, a lot of the gamey flavor of lamb comes from the fat. If you like that taste, you can skip the trim.
Here it is with the trimming done. Still lots of intermuscular fat for flavor. I forgot a before pic, but essentially the whole top of the roast is covered in a layer of fat. The trimmings are behind the roast.
Next comes the rub. I use a wet rub for the lamb. Equal parts olive oil and Dijon mustard, combines with three or four big cloves of garlic finally chopped, and a couple of tablespoons of fresh chopped rosemary. You want enough rub to cover the leg, I start with a three tablespoons of Dijon and olive oil, then combine the with garlic and rosemary. Finish it off with a good helping of salt and pepper to taste. You want enough to coat the lamb inside and out, just make more I need it.
Start by opening up the leg and apply the wet rub on the inside.
Then I roll the leg back up and apply the rest of the rub to the outside, all over. Finish up by retrussing the roast, which is why I save the butcher twin from the beginning.
And now we let the roast rest for a couple of hours to let the salt in the rub do its thing. I did this all at noon today and this will go in the oven at 4pm, it will be closer to room temp by that time as well.
Cooking time is about 20 minutes per pound at 375. That's for medium rare, we like it a little more on the bloody side and cook to an internal temp of 120, about 15 minutes per pound. If you notice the is a big muscle on one side of the roast, that is where the thermometer probe will go.
So now we wait till later this afternoon. Stay tooned!
We start with a half leg, de-boned. right off the bat that creates a little controversy, losing the bone takes away some flavor, but I'm lazy and it is easier to carve at the end. I've fixed these both bone in and boneless and I can't really tell the difference. This is about 5 lbs of meat before trimming. A full leg is 10 lbs. A half feeds my family of 4 with plenty of leftovers for sandwiches. And damn, lamb sandwiches or outstanding.
The butcher de-boned the leg and then trusses it up, I pull off the twine and set it aside, I'll use it later. Then I trim all of the fat cap off the leg. This again is a choice, a lot of the gamey flavor of lamb comes from the fat. If you like that taste, you can skip the trim.
Here it is with the trimming done. Still lots of intermuscular fat for flavor. I forgot a before pic, but essentially the whole top of the roast is covered in a layer of fat. The trimmings are behind the roast.
Next comes the rub. I use a wet rub for the lamb. Equal parts olive oil and Dijon mustard, combines with three or four big cloves of garlic finally chopped, and a couple of tablespoons of fresh chopped rosemary. You want enough rub to cover the leg, I start with a three tablespoons of Dijon and olive oil, then combine the with garlic and rosemary. Finish it off with a good helping of salt and pepper to taste. You want enough to coat the lamb inside and out, just make more I need it.
Start by opening up the leg and apply the wet rub on the inside.
Then I roll the leg back up and apply the rest of the rub to the outside, all over. Finish up by retrussing the roast, which is why I save the butcher twin from the beginning.
And now we let the roast rest for a couple of hours to let the salt in the rub do its thing. I did this all at noon today and this will go in the oven at 4pm, it will be closer to room temp by that time as well.
Cooking time is about 20 minutes per pound at 375. That's for medium rare, we like it a little more on the bloody side and cook to an internal temp of 120, about 15 minutes per pound. If you notice the is a big muscle on one side of the roast, that is where the thermometer probe will go.
So now we wait till later this afternoon. Stay tooned!
