How to Make Crumb-Crusted Rack of Lamb and Cheesy Brussels Sprout Gratin

today on cook's country ashley makes bridget a foolproof version of crumb-crusted rack of lamb adam reviews electric knives and christy makes julia the ultimate brussels sprout graton that's all right here on cook's country [Music] americans eat way more beef than lamb and one of the reasons may be a 19th century battle you've probably never heard of now that battle or series of battles was known as the range wars essentially it was a turf dispute between wyoming sheepherders and colorado cattlemen now john muir famously called sheep hoofed locusts because they were known for rapidly consuming and devastating grazing areas so when herders started driving their sheep towards established catalans those cattle ranchers responded with violence things escalated quickly in one incident cattlemen shot a sheepherder and caused his 3 800 sheep to stampede over a thousand foot bluff into parachute colorado eventually the law stepped in and the cattlemen emerged victorious but still today you can see the direct result of these range wars in the supermarket meat case where beef is plentiful but lamb is reserved for special occasions today we're tipping our hats to the sheepherders of the range horse i'm heading into the kitchen with ashley to make a beautiful crumb-crusted rack of lamb let's go [Music] it's not just beef that outsells lamb for every pound of lamb americans eat they eat about 50 pounds of pork for me that's before breakfast so ashley's here she's going to tell us all about lamb why we should be eating it and a great recipe to change our mind so this is a recipe for people that don't even like lamb i love lamb okay well you're really gonna love this one there's a main reason why a lot of people sometimes get deterred from the taste of lamb and that's because it usually has a gamey funkiness to it but a lot of that gamey funky flavor lives within the fat it's true so for this recipe we're able to control that gamey funky flavor because we start by trimming out a lot of the fat so here i have two racks they're about a one and three quarter to two pounds each and these are domestic you can either get lamb from here in the united states which tends to be a little bit bigger and a little bit more mild or you can get racks from australia or new zealand and just the opposite they're going to be a little bit smaller and they're going to be a little bit more gamey so i'm just trimming this fat down to an eighth of an inch so i think that looks pretty good i do too now we are going to be making our panko coating so here i have one cup of panko crumbs and that's the japanese bread crumbs really nice coarse texture just going to turn this over medium heat now i'm going to add two tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil two tablespoons of minced fresh thyme that's a good amount of time and then we have six cloves of minced fresh garlic all right now here we have an optional ingredient these are four minced anchovy fillets that i rinsed and then patted dry it really provided a really nice complex overall umami flavor to the bread crumbs right now i'm going to add two teaspoons of kosher salt and here we have one teaspoon of pepper and i'm just going to cook this again over medium-high heat until the bread crumbs are turning golden brown which will take about five minutes all right okay so it's been again five minutes and now we are cooking with gas here smells really good all right so i'm gonna transfer that to this 13 by nine dish this is going to make life a little bit easier in a few minutes but first i'm going to add a couple tablespoons of some minced fresh parsley and one tablespoon of lemon zest all right so i'm going to set that aside now let's move on to the lamb okay so first i need to wipe out the skillet so i have these paper towels here i'm gonna keep that over medium high heat and add one teaspoon of extra virgin olive oil and then move back over to our lamb all right so we need to season the lamb i have two teaspoons total of kosher salt one teaspoon per rack a little bit of pepper then i'm going to flip them over and do the other side all right and you know the pan is ready when the oil begins to just smoke so now i'm going to start by browning each rack i'm going to do one at a time and i'm going to go about two to four minutes per side until they're nice and golden brown start with the fat side down first those look pretty good and they've been resting at this point for about five minutes and really that's just so that they're cool enough to handle so here we have some dijon mustard we have a quarter cup of it and i'm just going to brush all sides of it and it's going to work in a couple different ways number one it's going to act as a glue it's going to hold this panko mixture onto the lamb but it's also going to give a little bit of extra kick got that savory dijon mustard and some acidity too and some acidity yep i'm going to do all sides don't be shy here because i don't want any bald spots i'm just going to transfer one rack at a time to our panko mixture like the mustard you want to make sure to get all the sides here so i have an oven that's been preheating at 300 degrees and we're going to be cooking these racks for 40 to 50 minutes until they register 135 degrees all right i'll get the oven for you and if you notice i have the fat cap side up so it can baste the meat [Music] oh that smells so good wow wow that is beautiful just like a restaurant all right so i'm going to take an internal temperature again we want 135 degrees for medium just gonna go right in the middle here i think we're looking pretty good yeah 135 degrees right on the nose all right now i am going to transfer the racks carefully to this cutting board i'm gonna let these rest for about 15 minutes not covered not covered putting foil on top would make it soggy now have you heard of mint jelly yes i have i love it but i wanted to make something different so this is a mint sauce anything with mint yeah mint and lamb goes together like you and i you know pb j i'm going to need about a half a cup chopped all right so i have the chopped mint and here i have six tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil one quarter cup of chopped fresh parsley adding a little bit more bulk and refreshing flavors to the sauce two tablespoons of fresh lemon juice one clove of minced garlic and here we have a half a teaspoon of kosher salt and a quarter teaspoon of pepper that's it that's it didn't have to make jelly no jelly here all right i think it's about time to slice into our lamb good so a couple of notes here so i'm going to be using a boning knife and that's because i found that along this interior here it's the rib cage and sometimes there are these little bones in there that like to hang out together but i found that with a boning knife if necessary i can kind of just shimmy around it and it makes for a really nice slice great so i'm going to hold the two ribs and then i'm using this as an anchor oh that one went right through no shimmying necessary oh man wow that is perfectly cooked oh here's that little shimmy thing i was going to tell you about all you had to do is just move the boning knife ever so slightly just like that and you get a perfect slice there we go i'm actually going to leave the tongs down thank you some mint sauce on the side that looked to be pretty potent so i bet a little goes a long way little dabble do ya i'm just savoring its beauty now it's time to rip it apart okay so succulent so juicy but it's so savory i mean it's a powerhouse that crumb coating exactly the garlic the lemon zest the parsley the lemon and the fresh bent of course the fresh parsley is just really cutting through the lamb carpe diem seize the lamb you know i wouldn't want to wait for a special occasion to make this dish all year every day is lamb day every day is lamb day especially with this recipe and that starts with trimming two racks of lamb mix panko with olive oil herbs and minced anchovies and then cook the crumb mixture until golden brown season and sear the lamb racks brush with dijon and coat with a crumb mixture roast to medium doneness let rest and then carve serve with an easy mint and parsley sauce so from cook's country a special occasion dish that's suitable anytime it's crumb-crusted rack of lamb electric knives are trying to make a comeback so adam's here to tell us if we should let them well julia these things kind of look a little more mid 20th century than they do digital age but they have been useful in the past and we were curious so we have this lineup of four different electric knives the price range was 19.92 to 122. that's pricey and they all work basically the same way you have two blades that attach at the tip like so and they get put into a handle that houses a motor like so and then you turn it on and the blades move in opposite directions that creates a sawing motion so that you can cut through things without a lot of downward pressure so it's great for baked goods that you don't want to squish or big roasts where you don't want to work too hard to get nice neat even slices our testers tried them on three different kinds of bread of different textures whole loaves of japanese milk bread which you know is super tender whole loaves of chala which is a little firmer but still on the tender side and then whole loaves of francese which has a tough crust sort of an artisan bread they also used our favorite serrated knife just for reference alongside to see what they thought they used them also on rotisserie chickens and on 20 pound roasted turkeys again with a manually operated just regular chef's knife alongside for a point of reference now all four of these knives actually had various problems with the bread some of them squished that really tender japanese milk bread some of them slid off the crust of the francese by and large testers really preferred just using a regular manual serrated knife but it was not the case for poultry poultry was really good so julia why don't you try that white one down there on this turkey breast there and just see what you think all right i kind of like it i was ready to make fun of this thing but look how thin that goes so your experience is mirroring the tester's experience you know one tester even said that carving a turkey with the electric knife made it feel effortless when's the last time you heard that about carving a turkey i've never heard that well it is pretty maneuverable yeah there are a couple of design features that came up in the testing the first one was the handle you can see that the bottom of this has these sort of hard edges these creases testers didn't like that they preferred a nice rounded handle that was more comfortable to grip give them a more secure grip and certainly if you're going to use it to carve a whole big holiday roast you're at it for a while so you want to have as comfortable grip as you can make sense the position of the power button also came up some of these have a power button on the bottom so you pull it up almost like a trigger using your index finger some of them two of them have power buttons on top why don't you try that one which has the power button on top cut a couple of slices with that oh you gotta press forward and down forward and down all right i gotta say this it feels like a power tool it feels like it should be in the garage yeah okay the truth comes out i slid a hedge trimmer into the top that's what i thought of especially with this handle it's also kind of kind of loud it's a little loud oh wow i have no dexterity with this at all it is just it's like using a chainsaw so customers really didn't like those top mounted buttons especially on this model you know if you're carving a big roast and you have to press that button down for a long time there were some thumb cramps yeah well i look i already have a bump on my thumb from pressing so hard workman's comp julia now you mentioned the noise this thing was also pretty loud and testers measured the noise levels with a decibel meter and this one was the loudest it was 89 decibels for a frame of reference a lawnmower is 90 decibels and you know regular conversations like the one we're having now between two civilized people are about 60 decibels much less much less also some of these things vibrated a little more a little less and testers didn't want too much vibration they also came with certain features some of them had special blades for cutting meat or bread different storage systems testers tried all of those but didn't really you know care for any of those features they wanted to keep it simple the one feature that made a big difference was having a safety lock that makes sense that's usually just a little toggle right on the power switch right there you can lock it in position so you can't press it by accident one of these knives didn't have that it was this one and testers worried that they could grab it if they were working really quickly and turn it on by accident or if you're at home and you have kids running through the kitchen and they get curious and turn it on that's an accident waiting to happen in the end that white one there which is this one was the winning electric knife this is the black and decker comfort grip nine inch electric knife it was the least expensive at 19.92 like that it had a great slicing ability it was the quietest it had the safety lock a comfortable handle and it's really good for you know a big holiday roast all right so there you have it electric knives do have their place around a holiday table and our favorite is the black decker comfort grip 9-inch electric knife at 19.92 [Music] in 2008 the heinz corporation did a study and found that brussels sprouts were the most hated vegetable in america but that is certainly not the case today and since then sales for the little sprout have increased tenfold and that's in part thanks to restaurant chefs who begin to really pair them with modern flavors and current techniques and today christy is going to show us an awesome new way to cook them in the form of a graton well i don't know that a gratan is the most modern approach but who doesn't like a vegetable that's tossed in a creamy cheese sauce and baked with a nice crust on top yes the problem is the technique so it's it's figuring out how to cook the vegetables properly so that they can shine in a dish like a gratin and we're going to figure that out okay first we're starting with the right size brussels sprouts so these are fairly small these are about the size of a golf ball the reason that we like to use this size is because they tend to be a lot more tender they are a lot sweeter than bigger brussels sprouts because the bigger ones are older so i'm just taking these and i'm going to slice off the very tip we don't want to cut off the whole bottom the whole core because that's holding them all together and then we'll just cut these in half now if you did have the bigger brussels sprouts it's fine they're not bad but you definitely want to quarter them instead of have them to make sure that they cooked properly now when you're buying brussels sprouts there's a few ways you can find them you can find them loose usually in a bin or in a bag the second way if you're lucky you can find them still on the stock which not only looks cool but they're less expensive and they'll last longer in the fridge so i have two and a half pounds of brussels sprouts that i've already prepped and i have a 13 by 9 inch graton dish this has already been greased i'm also adding a tablespoon of vegetable oil half teaspoon of salt and a quarter teaspoon of pepper just mix this all together now this is a broiler safe casserole dish and you want to make sure that you're using broiler safe dish because we're going to be roasting these at a high temperature now i've already heated my oven i have the rack in the middle position and the oven is cranked to 450 degrees we're going to roast these for 30 to 35 minutes and we're looking for them to be a nice browned color and the brussels sprouts will be tender if we stick a fork or a knife into them oh yeah these are so hot like i said this was a 450 degree oven so we are actually going to make the topping and the sauce while these cool down just a little bit so these can sit here anywhere between 5 minutes and 30 minutes they'll still be warm but they won't be this hot okay now we wanted to make sure that the topping was in fact toasted and crisp and so the best way to do that is to launch a pre-emptive strike and toast the topping before we put it on the casserole so i have one tablespoon of unsalted butter that's melting over medium heat in a medium saucepan i have a quarter cup of panko bread crumbs that i'll pop in here and we'll just toss these around in the butter until they're a nice light golden color we've just been toasting these for about three minutes now we'll put these into a bowl and these are not for snacking it's tempting and now i'll just season these so i have a quarter teaspoon each of salt and pepper that i'll add here and just toss them around so we'll just use the same sauce pans i'm just going to wipe it out so now again over medium heat i have two tablespoons of unsalted butter this time and we are going to begin our sauce i have to say that's a modest amount of butter for a graton usually grotons are a little on the heavy rich side oh wait wait did i speak too soon yes we'll get plenty of richness in there very very good i'm glad to hear that actually so the butter's melted i have one shallot that i've minced just gonna get some aromatics in there to bolster the flavor a bit and then one minced garlic clove and we really just want to let these cook for about a minute by the time we can smell them they're going to be finished cooking we're not looking for browning here and we certainly don't want to burn them now we need to thicken the sauce thick in the base so we'll add the other component of the roux and that's flour so this is one tablespoon of all-purpose flour and we'll mix it in we're just cooking this for about a minute we just want to cook off any of that raw flour taste this looks good so now it's time to add the liquid so here so you're happy i have one and a quarter cups of heavy cream and then three quarters of a cup of chicken stock so this will give us enough liquid first of all but it's also cutting that richness a little bit with some savoriness i like it now i am going to increase my heat to medium high we want this to come to a boil we're boiling julia looks like it's gotten a little bit thicker and that's all we needed to do so now i'm going to turn the heat off i'm actually going to remove the pan from the heat and now we add the cheese tell me more so we're actually using a combination of cheeses i have two ounces of shredded gruyere using half of it in the sauce right now and this is one ounce of parmesan that's been grated and that's half a cup that looks and smells great it's already nice and silky but now we need to add a few flavorings nutmeg of course this is a pinch of nutmeg and that's so classic in white sauces and it really brings out that nutty flavor in the cheeses and then a pinch of cayenne this is a quarter teaspoon of pepper and just an eighth of a teaspoon of salt it's a pretty simple recipe all in all it's not difficult it really isn't so i think we're all whisked together so let's head over to our brussels sprouts they've been waiting so patiently we're in that window five minutes to 30 minutes i'm just going to pour this it'll be a little dramatic oh goodness the brussels sprouts looked good without that gorgeous sauce now that's just gilding the lily all right let me move that aside so now you might wanna use your oven mitts or your towel so we'll get this all mixed together we're sauced up now we need to add the topping so we have our nice buttery crispy panko we'll just sprinkle this all over the top you really want a single layer if you have more than that you're not getting any heat on it now the cheese so this is the other quarter cup of the gruyere this is just going to give you that first bite of salty nutty goodness and it's actually going to melt and kind of give us a nice cohesive topping so now we're going back into the oven same temperature same rack that we used before 450 degrees just for about five to seven minutes what we're looking for is just reheating everything we're going to look for the sauce to start boiling around the edges and we want the whole top to get a nice golden brown color you're gonna go telling it i am oh that's a beautiful gretel oh yeah you see the bubbles all around the edge that's what we want oh yes gorgeous yes please looks good enough to eat christy it also looks as hot as a volcano yes so we have to let this wait for 10 minutes okay that's not so bad that's doable all right thank you for being so patient for those 10 minutes no need to skimp on my account okay i love that the sauce is thickened but it's not thick it's not stodgy it's not too tight right yes which old school gorchons used to have a very stodgy sauce this is a more modern sauce all right it has that nutty flavor of the roasted brussels sprouts mirrored in the gruyere and the parmesan and then that toasted top right and the brussels sprouts are really perfectly cooked they're tender but they haven't gone to mush that sauce just enough to accent the brussels sprouts but doesn't take over this is delicious i'm so happy right now christy thank you my pleasure if you want to make this killer brussels sprout graton start by having two and a half pounds of brussels sprouts and roast them right in the dish after toasting some bread crumbs for the topping make a simple sauce using a combination of heavy cream chicken broth gruyere and parmesan to finish bake the graton for just a few minutes until hot and bubbling from cook's country an amazing recipe for brussels sprout carton this is delicious thanks for watching cook's country from america's test kitchen so what'd you think leave a comment and let us know which recipes you're excited to make or just say hi now you can find links to today's recipes and reviews in the video description and don't forget to subscribe to our channel see you later alligator

Channel: America's Test Kitchen

Views: 48,537

Rating: 4.928205 out of 5

Keywords: rack of lamb, lamb, how to cook rack of lamb, brussels sprouts, brussels sprout gratin, cooks country, americas test kitchen, cooks illustrated

Id: oYwEQVCv6_s

Length: 23min 47sec (1427 seconds)

Published: Tue Aug 11 2020