How To Make Insanely Moist Slow Roast Lamb

Ramadan is coming up quick and that means hosting loads of dinner parties for friends and family there's one dish I serve nearly every time which is a roast leg of lamb it feeds loads of people has the juiciest meat and doesn't need much active work leaving you free to cook other things so here's my mother-in-law's recipe that I promise will be the star of your table there's three parts this simple technique that make it so good first you'll marinate the meat overnight packing flavor and tenderize it then you'll prepare the meat for roasting using a special technique and third you'll make some incredible vegetables with the meats juices it all starts the day before with a big chunk of bone and meat and although we generally use this technique for lamb there's nothing keeping you from using on other meats if you're going with lamb you can choose between a lamb leg or a lamb shoulder the main difference is that a lamb leg has a lot of meat so it feeds more people but it also has less fat and isn't as juicy shoulders on the other hand have about 20 percent less meat and they're not shaped for easy carving but all of the meat is incredibly soft and juicy just look how easy the bones pull out when I have a lot of guests I always make two small shoulders instead of a large leg because it's just so much better I'll trim and cook both of them to show you the difference but the same techniques and measurements apply to either one before marinating the meat you should clean it up or ask if your butcher can do this for you it isn't strictly necessary and I tend not to do it if there isn't too much fat or silver skin but on these ones I'll trim it slightly what I'm looking for is patches of fat that have a dry or shiny appearance or thin silvery skin these don't soften when the meat is cooked and so removing them helps the texture with a sharp knife I'm just cutting around them and then using my fingers to pull them from the muscles beneath oh yeah and get rid of the stamps too as they look ugly and taste bad the other benefit to removing these is that it helps expose more meat so the marinade can penetrate better but it's a balancing game as the fat helps keep the meat moist once you're happy with how it looks it's time to make the tenderizing marinade which is made from simple ingredients that you already have and a huge load of onions onions are key to most Middle Eastern grilled dishes as they add a ton of flavor and contain enzymes that soften eat the more muscle is used the tougher it gets and so this marinade really helps for tough cuts that might otherwise be chewy like Lamb's legs when you've cut up your onions break out a blender or food processor then add them to it along with a good amount of garlic some black peppercorns and a bunch of salt that gets Blended together into a paste and to get there I usually add a few tablespoons of water to help it start blending you can also add other spices if you want and just blend that until the onion is well broken down and you have a delicious looking onion milkshake pour yourself a tall glass and enjoy the smooth refreshing Taste of pure onion juice delicious to be real though the marinade should be salty and very oniony it's both going to infuse the meat with flavor and act as a wet brine which will help to season the meat from the inside all you need to do now is apply the marinade to the meat I find this strong Ziploc style bags really good for marinating just check that your fits then add the marinade and massage it into the meat you want to evenly coat it from top to bottom then seal the bag and remove as much air as you can the more onion that is in contact with the meat the after the effects of the marinade these bags can then be placed straight in the fridge or you should let the meat marinade for at least 12 hours 12 hours later the meat is going to look very different cut open the bag and then use a spatula to scrape all of the onion marinade off of the meat this is going to burn in the oven so get rid of as much of it as possible now let's take a closer look first thing you'll notice is the color has changed this happens due to the meat being wet but also partly down to the marinade penetrating into the meat the other thing is that the meat is much softer even the tough candies at the top of the leg have softened completely if you poke it hard enough with a finger you can actually push through the meat fibers and Dent it this is proof that the marinade has worked and you're going to end up with a tender roast before we cook it though we'll add extra flavor by stuffing the meat with some garlic and black peppercorns poke some holes into the thicker parts of the meat and fill them with slices of garlic and Peppercorns in each one you don't need to go crazy but add enough that it feels evenly spread on the top and bottom after that take some nutmeg and grate a small amount over the entire lamb leg Now set your oven to 160 degrees Celsius and then you'll wrap the meat we're going back to a technique that my ancient Egyptian family use 100 of generations ago it involves mummifying the meat but we're going to modernize it you might see this in French or Italian cooking but they stole it from us this traps Steam and fat inside the paper keeping the meat moist and then allowing it to fry in its own fat later you're going to need some flexible paper for this so let's make some take a roll apart from paper and cut two really long sheets that are three times the length of your joint of meat roll and crumple them up into balls then place them in a bowl of water for about 10 seconds until they start to soften then unwrap them and squeeze out the excess water what this does is make the paper softer malleable so they're going to act more like fabric than paper meaning we can wrap them rather than fold them around the meat easily it's much easier to wrap this around anything and completely seal it in like a Scarlet so when you're ready place the paper on your board and place the meat on top then you just get to folding the paper you want it wrapped tightly and covering the entire length of the leg and because this is quite thin you should double it up with a second layer of paper in the end your lamb should be completely sealed meaning there's nowhere for the Steam and fat to go so they stay in the paint paper the last thing you do is place the wrapped meat snugly into a baking dish and then cover it with a tight fitting foil lid place the tray into your oven and this will cook for between four to six hours set a timer and check it about every hour just to make sure nothing is burning around the two hour mark of cooking the meat I take it out of the oven and deglaze any brown bits that are in the bottom of the pan to get some juices boiling water and a spatula make quick work of them and you're left with some beautiful roast stock that is packed with flavor on the second one I didn't even need to deglaze it while the meat continues to cook you'll need to prepare the roast vegetables I always go with these three carrots potatoes and shallots but honestly any sort of good roasting vegetable can be used carrots should be peeled or washed to clean up the skin and then chopped into large chunks as they shrink a lot potatoes can be peeled and chopped in half or into quarters and then the shallots I just peel them and use them whole I laid these out into a tray and then coat them in a flavorful mixture to make it take a small food processor and add an onion with a little salt and black pepper and then pour in about 100 milliliters of salt The crucial part to make this flavorful is to run the blender at full speed to the stock splashes everywhere the ABS are torture of cleaning up the mess is scientifically proven to make the food taste better actually it feels leaks like this you're better off blending the onion first and then adding the stocking stages until it transforms into a liquid then you pour that mixture over the vegetables and mix them together thoroughly so they're all coated that only needs to cook for an hour so put them in the oven when the meat has about an hour left speaking of which after the three hour mark you want to check the meat regularly you don't want any liquid to burn in the trays so if you see it get dark like this add the remaining stock or some water to stop the liquid burning don't do this though if it's already burnt and black as the flavor will seep into the meat you can also Place fed under the meat for this final stage and I sometimes just cook it like this I'm just doing it here as I have some leftovers and although the liquid is quite dark I think I caught it in time as it doesn't taste burnt when the hour of cooking the vegetables is up they should look something like this if not give them a toss and 10 minutes under the grill to Brown you can see they're really caramelized on a coated in the reduced onion and lamb mixture which means they're packed with Flavor now at this point it's been about six hours and my meat is looking ready I can tell because first it's been in the oven forever the second is very soft to the touch you can start ripping off that paper carefully all your long cover is a row slam shoulder that looks like it's been deep fried sometimes it isn't as well browned and in that case I usually put it under the grill for five minutes the alarm shoulder is looking incredibly moist and it's calling my name but first let's check the link you'll see that this actually looks quite a bit drier than the shoulder this is expected of leg the small muscle off to the side has very little fat so it can be dry no matter how you cook it but generally Under the Skin it will still be quite moist to Plate this up you just add your vegetables to a serving platter in a pile and place the meat on top it's quite a good looking dish and considering that these were wrapped in baking paper the entire time they're both browned well now to demonstrate how soft the meat is first I just wiggle the shoulder bone to pop it out and then crack it to the skin to release the juicy meat this always works great torn into chunks so instead of slicing it try serving it with some Forks instead little OB dream of doing this all the time so I'm going to make my dream come true so so juicy now it might look a bit fibrous but it's got a lot of fat in it so you don't feel those fibers at all before someone calls me uncivilized of course I'm having some vegetables too oh my God okay Maple has been begging me for some for ages gonna eat on the floor let's put it for you you want some you want some if you want some [Music]

Channel: Middle Eats

Views: 98,447

Keywords: Middle Eats, middle eastern cuisine, egyptian food, middle eastern food, egyptian lamb, arab lamb, lahma, la7ma, lahma recipe, fakhda, fakhda recipe, egyptian lamb leg, egyptian lamb shoulder, lamb shoulder recipe, lamb leg recipe, roast lamb, roast lamb leg, roast lamb shoulder

Id: KdAfGYt_YpY

Length: 8min 47sec (527 seconds)

Published: Fri Mar 10 2023