My Lime Green Kitchen

Posts Tagged ‘Potatoes’

Two things I want you to know about this recipe:

1. If you think you don’t like lamb . . just try this recipe.  It’s so good . . so very good.  I think we’re going to have it every day in 2010! 
2. If it looks hard . . it’s just because it’s long and I took too many pictures.  It’s not hard.  It’s so easy and it sits in the oven forever while you sew or knit or shop online.  And, while it’s cooking, it makes your house smell so good!

I adapted this recipe from a FoodNetwork recipe.  One thing I changed from the original recipe is their recipe calls for lamb shanks and while I generally prefer shanks for soups and stews, for lamb I prefer chops.  The bone is still in there so you get some added flavor, they’re very tender and they don’t have all that connective tissue and fat that has that kinda strange “lamby” taste.  I love lamb chops but do not like leg of lamb at all so maybe it’s just me.

And, in my picture you’ll see that I have whole cloves and the recipe calls for ground cloves.  I ran out of ground cloves!

Ingredients:

3/4 c. flour
Salt & Pepper to taste
8 or 9 lamb chops, trimmed of all visible fat
Olive oil
5 cloves garlic, chopped
1 pound carrots, sliced about 1/2″ thick
1 large onion, coarsely chopped
2 bay leaves
1/2 tsp. dried thyme
1/4 tsp. ground cloves
3 cups red wine
2 quarts beef stock
1 cup barley
6 large russet potatoes

For Topping

12 – 14 cloves garlic, finely chopped
Salt & Pepper
1-1/2 cups chopped fresh parsley
1 stick butter
2 T. olive oil.

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350°.

Season flour with salt and pepper . . whatever amount you think you need.  You can adjust seasonings later.  Dredge lamb chops in flour.

Brown the chops in olive oil over medium-high heat.  They do not need to be fully cooked — just nice and brown.

Remove lamb chops to another dish.  If you need a bit more olive oil in the pot, add it.  Add the carrots, onion and 5 cloves chopped garlic.  Cook til onions are clear.

Add thyme, cloves and bay leaf.  Continue to cook for a couple of minutes.  Return lamb chops to pan.  Add wine, beef stock and barley.  Cover and place in oven for 2 hours.

For the Topping:

While the stew is cooking, chop the remaining garlic and parsley.

Melt butter in a pan and add olive oil oil.  Add the garlic and parsley. Season to taste with salt and pepper.  Simmer over low heat for 20 minutes.  Remove from heat and let sit til needed.

After the stew has been cooking for 2 hours, remove from oven.  Peel potatoes and cut into half lengthwise.  Lay on top of stew (like a crust).  You may have to cut some of the potatoes to get all the holes covered and get them to fit.  It doesn’t have to be perfect though.  Put about half of the garlic/parsley mix on top of the potatoes.  Cover the dish and place the dish back in the oven and cook another 45 minutes.

Add the remaining garlic/parsley mix and continue to cook, uncovered for another 15-20 minutes.

Serve, making sure to place a lamb chop or two in every dish.

If you love basil, you should like this recipe and it’s real easy.

Cut however many potatoes you want into small chunks. Brown them (I used bacon fat but I’m betting some of you are squealing in horror after reading that!). Season them but don’t put as much salt as you might otherwise.

Lightly toast some pine nuts.

Dump the pine nuts in with the potatoes.

Squirt in some Pesto. As much or as little as you’d like. We like a lot! If you can’t find this at your local store, you can order it from Amazon.com. That’s what I have to do.

Mix it all up. Yummmm!