I totally hesitated posting this recipe and not because it wasn’t delicious but because it photographed completely unappetising and blah.
Brown food is sooo hard to make look like you want to lick it off the screen…unless it’s chocolate.
I mean I wouldn’t blame you if you looked at these photos and went, um yeah, jules, I’m thinking of passing on this one.
Hold it. Hold it right there.
This shit is good and it couldn’t be easier to make. The lamb is so tender you could eat it with a fork, the onions are sweet from the long braise, and then you have the saltiness of the olives and feta, lightened by the fine slices of lemon. As I said, this is gooooood, you just need to not judge a book by its cover. This dish has per-so-nality.
Braised lamb shoulder with olives and lemon
from the greek issue of Gourmet Traveller Oct 2011.
Serves 6
what you need:
- 1.5 kg piece of boneless lamb shoulder, trimmed and cut into 4 cm pieces
- 250 g cherry tomatoes, halved
- 200 g kalamata olives
- 200 ml dry white wine
- 200 g greek feta, crumbled
- 8 garlic cloves, sliced finely
- 2 onions, finely sliced
- 2 lemons, halved then finely sliced (leave skin on)
- 2 tbsp dried oregano (if you can get greek oregano, use this preferably)
- 3 bay leaves
- salt & pepper
- 200gm greek yoghurt
- 1 garlic clove crushed
what to do:
Preheat the oven 150C/300F.
In a large deep baking dish, put all the ingredients in, season to taste, and spread evenly in the dish. Cover with baking paper and then aluminium foil or use a lid if your baking dish has one.
Roast for 3 1/2 to 4 hours or until lamb is tender.
Make yoghurt sauce by mixing together the yoghurt and garlic.
Serve lamb with yoghurt sauce and boiled buttered potatoes with chopped parsley.
