Cooking for the Australian Grand Prix: Roast Lamb
Welcome to Grand Prix Gastronomy! This week, I’m cooking roast lamb, the national dish of Australia.
This project is pretty simple. As a complement to each race weekend, I’ll be cooking the national dish of that race’s host country and sharing information about the process and that dish’s history along the way in an effort to grow more deeply immersed in the local culture from my own home.
What Is Roast Lamb?
According to Taste Australia, a massive national poll showed that most Aussies consider roast lamb to be their national dish. I’m sure this probably comes as a disappointment to the folks who were gunning for meat pies or an excuse for me to use vegemite, but I’m listening to what the 24,000 folks surveyed had to say on the matter, because I’m assuming that the people who live in the country know better than me!
(This is going to be a pretty common theme throughout the year, I think; if you’re wondering what dish I’m selecting, you can pretty much bet it’s whatever a large survey of locals decided. That means nothing should really come as a surprise — but it does also mean that I may not pick something we obviously associate with a particular country, such as meat pies.)
Roast lamb is also one of the recipes in this project that doesn’t really need a deep explanation of exactly what it is, or what makes it regionally unique. It is, as advertised, a big ol’ hunk of meat that will be seasoned and roasted in the oven, along with some tasty veggies.
This Week's Recipe
I wasn’t entirely sure how an Australian lamb roast would differ from, say, an American beef roast, so I turned to a source that seemed to know what it was talking about: Australian Lamb. I’ve mentioned before my hesitation when it comes to cooking lamb, so I wanted to find something that was both reminiscent of what a family might actually cook for Sunday dinner Down Under while also featuring flavors I enjoy and a preparation that didn’t feel massively intimidating. The combination of garlic and thyme is one of my favorites (I obsessively make garlic thyme butter any time I make dinner rolls), and you can’t really go wrong with roasted potatoes.
Cooking Roast Lamb
Friends. Associates. I beg of ye: read the damn recipe. Please. Read the recipe.
I did not read the recipe, so I realized that I had actually started things off on the wrong foot after I had put my lamb in the oven. The recipe I selected involved leg of lamb. I had lamb shoulder. Everything worked out fine in the end, because if there is one thing I can do in the kitchen, it's operate explicitly on vibes and end up with a decent result, but it was a whole lot of stress I didn't need as I frantically researched the ideal cooking process for roast lamb shoulder as compared to roast lamb leg.
Anyway. On to the recipe.
I had cooked ahead in the F1 schedule before I went back and cooked up my lamb recipes, so I was refreshed by how familiar this recipe was. I have made and consumed many a roast in my day, so the basic formula — roughly chopped veggies, seasoned meat, lots of time in the oven — was simple.
I did make a few alterations to the recipe, aside from the unintentional “totally wrong cut of meat” change. I don't know what sebago potatoes are, so I just grabbed some purple-skinned taters at the store that I love to use when I'm roasting veggies. I also mixed the chopped veggies with oil, garlic, and thyme, even though the recipe only called for a drizzle of oil; I like garlic and thyme, so it's gonna go on everything. I will not apologize for an egregious use of seasoning. I also intended to roast more carrots but forgot that I intended to do that. Just know that I wanted to.
Other than that, I didn't mess with things. I tented the dish in tinfoil for the first hour of cooking as the recipe required, but if you're using lamb shoulder like me, definitely remove the foil earlier. My meat had actually cooked through while tented, but it didn't get a ton of browning thanks to the cover (though it did stay nice and juicy). I finished the lamb as the recipe required, then popped it under the broiler to give it a nice crisp and browned exterior. With that done, I pulled everything out of the oven and put the meat on a separate plate to rest.
As I let the meat rest, I actually cranked up the heat of the oven and put the vegetables back in for a while because I like mine nice and crisp, not mushy, and some didn't get a chance to really roast with the lamb resting on top. It worked out immensely well, and I ended up with some wonderful caramelized veggies as the meat settled. At the same time, I let some spinach and snap peas steam on the stove because I forgot that I had frozen peas; when they were done, I covered it all with butter because butter is good, and plated everything up.
So, What's the Verdict?
Remember how I was really nervous about cooking with lamb when I made tharid for Saudi Arabia? This roast lamb fully convinced me that I've been missing out on a whole genre of meat for ages; it sounds silly, but I took a bite of this dish and immediately thought to myself, “Oh, well, this just tastes like meat.” It wasn't gamey, it wasn't weirdly textured, it wasn't unnecessarily unwieldy to cook. It was just meat.
In the future, I'd definitely make this dish, but I think I'd likely try to pierce the meat to stick some herbs and garlic inside it, so the flavors penetrate to the deeper parts of the lamb. It was still great, but I think a nice punch of garlic inside those thicker sections would be great.
The rest of the dish was super familiar to me; steamed and roasted veggies make regular appearances on my dinner plate, which I think really helped me ease into the lamb itself. I knew there would at least be a significant part of my meal that I loved — and thankfully, the lamb was just as tasty.
I served it all up alongside an Australian pinot noir, which is a great wine for pairing with food thanks to its high acidity and low tannins. Australian pinots shine through fruity flavors like cherry and raspberry, so it was kind of like having a spiced cranberry sauce alongside Thanksgiving dinner. Aussie wines get bonus points in my book because they come with screw caps, and that means I don't have to struggle with a cork.
Let's Chat!
Another massive thank you to everyone who joined me last race to cook tharid in honor of Saudi Arabia. That shit looked delicious.
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You did a great job, this looks delicious! Perfect pairing with the Pinot too! You are right that making incisions into the lamb first does help penetrate the flavour, personally I score using a really sharp knife before rubbing in a mixture of olive oil, garlic with salt and pepper into the cut then stuffing with a sprig of rosemary - although as you prefer thyme it would work just as well :)
No rosemary on the lamb? Blasphemy! And honestly, using a shoulder is great - it's a really forgiving cut as it is fatty with a lot of bone, so you can just cook the hell out of it and it will usually still be wonderful.