A couple of years ago I had a dish at a restaurant in the Hunter Valley where the chef had taken a lamb shoulder still on the bone and had his butcher saw it into chunks.
The chunks of lamb were then slowly braised in white wine and herbs and by cooking the lamb on the bone instead of using cubes added a greater level of depth and intensity to the dish.
By slowly braising the meat it becomes so tender that you only need a fork or a spoon to help peel it away.
People often use lamb shanks for this type of dish, but the meat from the shoulder is a little bit sweeter and goes really well with the fresh peas.
Here is my reverse engineered interpretation.
Serves 4
What you’ll need
1 lamb shoulder, on the bone. Ask your butcher to saw it into small chunks for braising.
2 medium brown onions, diced
1 medium carrot, sliced
2 garlic cloves, finely diced
6-8 chat potatoes, halved
250ml white wine, something dry
1L good quality Beef Stock (don’t use stock cubes)
1 cup freshly podded peas (its really worth using fresh peas not frozen ones for this dish)
A good pinch of dried thyme leaves (or 2 sprigs of fresh thyme)
Olive Oil
How to put it together
1. Pre heat your oven to 140C.
2. Take a large Dutch oven or cast iron pot with a lid and place it on the stove over a medium heat. Add some olive oil and brown off the chunks of lamb in batches. Reserve to a bowl.
3. If there is too much residual oil from the rendered lamb fat in the pot, pour some off and then add the onion and carrot and stir for a 4-5 minutes or until soft. Add the garlic and stir for another 1-2 minutes.
4. Return the lamb to the pot, add the white wine and bring to a boil. Give it a good stir to coat the lamb and let it simmer for 5 minutes to reduce the wine and intensify the flavour. This will also burn off any harsh alcohol flavours.
5. Add the stock, bay leaf, thyme leaves and some freshly cracked pepper. The stock is pretty salty, so no need to season. The liquid should cover most of the lamb.
6. Stir to combine and bring the mixture to the boil. You may see some froth/scum developing on top of the liquid, just skim this off with a spoon.
7. Put a tight fitting lid onto the pot and place in the oven for 3 hours. Then add the potatoes and put back in the oven for a further 30 mins or until the potatoes are nice and tender.
8. Remove from the oven and stir in the fresh peas, they only need to be poached for a minute before serving.
9. Ladle into big bowls with lots of the broth and serve with a bowl in the middle of the table for the discarded lamb bones.
