The Meatwave

I was looking back at all my Easter recipes and noticed that year after year I've been cooking the same thing—leg of lamb. I had a bit of a breakdown thinking I've lost some creativity and fallen into a predicable pattern that's not representative of the experimentation that I love in cooking. So I went off racking my brain about what else I would love on Easter, and the more I thought, the more nothing came up that could rival a leg of lamb. Instead of making something inferior, I decided that maybe the repetition isn't such a bad thing. For one, it's incredibly delicious and a treat that I usually need an excuse like a holiday to make. Second, there are no limitations on how to introduce new flavors into a leg of lamb—while I've been doing the same cut each year, each subsequent recipe is pretty unique from the last. So another leg of lamb it is, this year adorned with a rosemary, garlic, and mustard crust.

I say leg of lamb is usually reserved for a holiday, and that's mainly because of the high cost of purchasing a full butterflied leg. I thought it was time to mitigate that a bit and learn how to butterfly the leg myself. I didn't come out with a piece that represented the skill of my butcher—it wasn't as even and had a couple holes here and there—but it wasn't too bad either and had the added bonus of savings a few bucks.

With the leg butterflied, I ventured forth with infusing garlic flavor throughout by cutting small slits into the meat and pushing little pieces of garlic into them. This method creates pockets of intense roasted garlic flavor as the leg of lamb cooks on the grill.

For the marinade, even more garlic was combined with mustard, whole grain Dijon mustard, olive oil, white wine, rosemary, and lemon juice.

This thick and textured paste was poured all over the lamb and let rest in the fridge overnight to soak up some flavor.

Out of the fridge, the mustard marinade clung heavily to the lamb, keeping it well coated when it hit the high heat of the grill.

The leg cooked quickly, turning that paste turned into a beautiful brown crust. The relatively thin leg of lamb only took about ten minutes to hit 130 degrees—the medium-rare mark that I think delivers the perfect combo of texture and flavor for leg of lamb.

This lamb gave back a lot for what little effort went into it. The meat had a rich lamby flavor and a silky texture. The mustard crust gave it a noticeable heft, adding a slight bite and herbal character that complemented the meat nicely. It was decidedly different than other leg of lambs that I had done in the past and left me with a feeling of content—even if I'm making the same piece of meat each Easter, at least I'm not only doing it differently, but each one just seems to be getting better and better.

Published on Tue Mar 26, 2013 by Joshua Bousel

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