Special Father’s Day recipe

I went up to our local butcher Martin Morris on Main Street Mountmellick to look for ideas for a dish for this month. Martin is a fifth generation butcher and supplies all our meats to us daily, I asked Martin had he anything nice for me and he arrived out with the most beautiful Leg of Irish Lamb and I thought that will do just nicely. So this week we are paying homage to a very special dish, Roast leg of Lamb.  When you have a cut of meat that fresh and tender it is best to keep it simple and let the natural flavour of the Lamb rule the dish.

Another mouth-watering recipe from Enas at the Mill

Ingredients:

For the lamb

• 2kg/4½lb leg of lamb, on the bone ( your butcher will gladly remove the bone for you if you wish and roll it for you
• 3 large garlic cloves
• 4-5 stalks of Rosemary
• salt and freshly ground black pepper

For the gravy

• 125ml/4½fl oz red wine
• small knob of butter
• equal amount of plain flour

Let’s get started

1. Preheat the oven to 200C/400F/Gas 6. Remove the lamb from the fridge and allow it to get to room temperature.
2. With a sharp thin knife or a metal skewer, make between 30 and 50 small incisions into the flesh of the lamb. They should be large enough for you to stick just your fingertip into, place the rosemary and garlic cloves into the holes.
3. Place the lamb in a roasting tin, cover loosely with foil and place in the preheated oven. As it heats up, the butter will melt and help the rosemary and garlic to work their way into the holes and really penetrate the lamb.
4. After 30 minutes, remove the foil and leave to roast for a further 50-60 minutes (for medium) or until cooked to your liking.
5. At the end of cooking time, remove the lamb from the oven and leave it to rest in the roasting tin for 10-15 minutes, with some foil on top to keep it warm.
6. Make the gravy. Heat a heavy-based frying pan on the hob. When hot, pour the pan juices from the roasting tin into the pan (be careful as it may splatter). Add the red wine. Turn the heat down and leave the sauce to reduce.
7. To thicken the sauce, make a beurre manie by mixing together the flour and butter in a clean bowl to make a paste. Add about a teaspoon of the beurre manie to the pan and whisk well, until the sauce has the desired consistency.
8. To serve, slice the lamb and pour over the gravy. Garnish with a couple stalks of fresh rosemary. This would be good with lovely boiled spring cabbage, for a Sunday lunch.