Here’s the best way to secure the success of your roast leg of lamb this Easter: Choose a high-quality, independent butcher, and have him or her help you select the very best product you can afford.
If you do not spend the effort to find an excellent piece of meat, your roast will surely fail.
Here is why: Roasting is the simplest of all ways to cook meat (all you really do is put it in the oven, and then take it out later), and requires very few extraneous ingredients (all it takes is the meat, salt, maybe some oil, and possibly an aromatic like garlic or herbs). There’s not a lot of flavor added or technique exercised between the butcher and the plate to obscure your initial purchase. What you taste, if you’ve roasted the meat carefully and correctly, is the meat you purchased. And nothing much more.
This is particularly true with a luxurious Easter leg of lamb. Selection of the leg is not just important, it is everything.
Tell your butcher how many people you’d like to serve, and inquire about where the lamb was raised. If possible, get Colorado lamb; not only is it local, it is also some of the very best in the world.
Buy a little bit more lamb than you need, because you’ll surely want leftovers for sandwiches and so forth. A larger roast also creates a sense of drama and a feeling of celebration, both of which are welcome on Easter. Plus, roasting a larger leg is a safer bet: You’re more likely to please all of your guests, as a larger roast will have more gradations between rare and more thoroughly cooked meat. Everyone will find a slice that suits.
It is best to have your leg of lamb in hand at least a day ahead of time, if not two days. To ensure availability for Easter Sunday, contact the best butcher in your neighborhood today, and request a leg to pick up on Saturday.
Once home, unwrap your leg of lamb, place it on a rack that you’ve secured on a sheet pan or in a roasting pan, and slide it, uncovered, into the refrigerator, where it must sit, unmolested, for at least 18 hours. You may admire it each time you open the fridge for other provisions, but don’t linger; keeping a refrigerator door open for more than a minute or so is a clear kitchen foul.
On the day of your feast, remove your roast from the refrigerator two hours before you plan to start cooking. You must start your roast in the oven at room temperature, not cold. This will help ensure more even cooking, a more gradual gradation from the crunchy brown crust to the soft, pink center.
Start the oven about 20 minutes before you plan to cook. Set it to 450 degrees — for a nice crust, you must start the roast hot. (Later, you’ll turn it down to finish.)
Here are the only things you’ll add to your roast: salt, garlic and rosemary. Unless you’d like to also use a few filets of anchovy to season the meat. (This is up to you. There is a natural, inexplicable affinity between anchovy and roast lamb; after roasting, you will not taste fish, just an unidentifiable, savory, salty aspect to the meat and a distant tang to the juices.)
For a 7 pound bone-in leg of lamb (which will easily serve eight people heartily, with leftovers), you will need 10 garlic cloves, a few sprigs of fresh rosemary and/or thyme, about 2 tablespoons of olive oil, and about 2 tablespoons of coarse salt. If you are also using anchovy fillets, you will need 10 total.
Use your sharpest paring knife to create 20 small slits in your roast, about an inch deep. Then, using your hands, rub the meat all over with the olive oil and set it on the rack in your heavy-duty roasting pan. Next, smash your garlic cloves, peel then, and insert them into 10 of the slits. Stuff the other slits with small pieces of rosemary and/or thyme. If you are using anchovy, nestle them into the garlic- stuffed slits.
Finally, sprinkle the salt over all and, using your hands again, give the roast a final massage.
It now goes into the hot oven. Allow the roast about 25 minutes at 450 degrees before reducing the heat to 300. After another 90 minutes, remove the roast to the stovetop. Insert an instant-read thermometer into a thick section of meat (but not near the bone). If it reads 130-135, you will have a medium-rare roast. If it reads 120 or lower, it needs another 10 minutes or so.
The second-most-important step of the entire process (shopping being the most important) comes at the end: resting the meat. It is remarkable how much a 20-30 minute rest matters. It allows the roast to finish cooking (residual heat will actually bring the internal temperature up a few degrees), and it will relax the flesh and redistribute the juices to create a buttery texture. Roasts served directly from the oven are unfailingly chewy and not uniformly textured.
To rest, remove the meat from the roasting pan, place it on a cutting board with recessed “moats” to catch any juices, and tent it loosely with a sheet of aluminum foil, with the shiny side facing out.
I like my lamb with a simple salsa verde or a garlicky aioli (see Page 3D for recipes), but if you would like to create a sauce or a gravy from the juices in the roasting pan, now is the time to do so. Skim some (but not all) of the fat first, then create your sauce (mustard sauce, wine sauce, any sauce you prefer), adding in any juices collected in the moat of your cutting board. (If you, like me, prefer a salsa verde or an aioli with your lamb, you will have prepared these earlier to allow their flavors to meld.)
After the roast has rested, it is ready for carving. If you are a supremely skilled carver, perform this in front of your guests; if not, carve carefully in the kitchen using your sharpest knife and clean hands. Create thin slices, angled slightly off the run of the bone so that you aren’t cutting perpendicular to the bone. This will take your knife through the grain of the meat and net you the softest, most pleasant texture, which your guests will certainly appreciate.
Roast Leg of Lamb
Recipe by Tucker Shaw. Serves 8 with leftovers.
Ingredients
1 leg of lamb, purchased from the best butcher in your area, trimmed and ready for roasting, about 7 pounds
2 tablespoons olive oil, plus more if needed
10 garlic cloves, smashed
10 sprigs fresh rosemary and/or thyme
10 anchovy fillets (optional)
2 tablespoons coarse salt
Directions
Place lamb in refrigerator, uncovered, overnight. Two hours before cooking, remove it from the refrigerator and allow to come to room temperature. Place on rack in roasting pan, fattiest side up.
Place oven rack in lower third of oven. Preheat to 450 degrees. Using a sharp paring knife, create 20 small slits in the top and sides of the leg, about 1-inch deep. Rub olive oil all over leg, then insert garlic cloves, herbs and anchovies, if using, into slits. Sprinkle salt over all, massaging into the meat.
Place lamb leg in oven. Cook for 25 minutes at 450, then reduce heat to 300 and continue to cook for another 90 minutes or more, until internal temperature reaches 130 degrees on an instant-read thermometer. Remove leg, place on cutting board, and tent loosely with foil. Allow to rest 30 minutes before carving into thin slices and serving. Serve with salsa verde, aioli or fruit mustard (recipes at denverpost.com/food).
