Warm Lamb and Potato Salad with a Mint Dressing

The most important criterion for me when I’m cooking for a small crowd (and I’m talking about 10 people or more) is that every key element of the dish can be prepared many hours in advance, then heated, assembled and dished up with minimum fuss, at the last moment, so it arrives at the table fresh, hot and delicious. This is the fourth in a series of recipes for Woolworths, pantry sponsors of MasterChef South Africa.

An easy way to stretch an expensive leg of lamb between many mouths.

Obviously this is not possible for MasterChef contestants faced with the challenge of catering for a horde (given the tight time-frames of reality TV).  But for home cooks, painstaking planning and preparation are the secrets to success when you’re expecting a flock of hungry guests. A recipe that allows you partly to cook the ingredients well ahead of time, without any significant loss of freshness, flavour or texture, is the best bet, because all you need do is take 20 minutes or so to finish them off in pan or oven, fling the dish together and carry it triumphantly to the table.

This recipe for a warm salad of garlicky, rosemaried lamb, baby potatoes and peas allows you to do just that, and it’s economical in the sense that it stretches a single leg of lamb (which is ruinously expensive these days, for reasons I cannot understand) between many mouths. In the recipe below, I’ve given instructions for preparing the dish well ahead of time and then assembling it at the last minute.

You’ll save a lot of money if you buy a whole leg of lamb and debone it yourself (see Cook’s Notes, below), or ask your butcher to do it for you.

It’s important to serve this warm, as it’s the heat of the potatoes and lamb that releases the minty, mustardy, lemony flavours of the dressing.

My other recipes for Woolworths #wooliespantry: 

Curried Lamb Ribbetjies with Mint Yoghurt
Champ with Chives and Garlic
Gin-Cured Gravadlax with Crisped Capers

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Warm Lamb and Potato Salad with a Mint Dressing

1 x 3.5 kg leg of lamb, deboned and butterflied
6 sprigs fresh rosemary
4 cloves garlic, peeled and finely sliced
3 Tbsp (45 ml) olive oil, plus extra for frying
a large lemon
milled black pepper
3.5 kg new potatoes
olive or sunflower oil, for frying
4 cups frozen baby peas
baby mint leaves, to garnish

For the dressing:
4 tsp (20 ml) good Dijon mustard
1 large clove garlic, peeled and crushed
6 Tbsp (90 ml) freshly squeezed lemon juice
½ tsp (2.5 ml) white sugar
flaky sea salt
milled pepper
1 cup (250 ml) extra-virgin olive oil
a big handful of fresh mint leaves (about ¾ cup, loosely packed)

Lay the butterflied lamb, skin side down, in a large non-metallic dish. Scatter over the rosemary sprigs and garlic slices and drizzle with 3 Tbsp olive oil. Cut the lemon in half and squeeze the juice over the lamb, then slice the squeezed-out lemon halves and arrange them on top of the lamb. Season well with milled black pepper (but no salt). Fold the lamb ‘butterfly’ in half to enclose the filling and cover the dish with clingfilm. Marinate in the fridge for 24 hours (a minimum of 12), turning the lamb over once or twice during that time.

Now prepare the potatoes. Cook them in plenty of boiling salted water for 10 minutes, or until just tender when pierced with the tip of a sharp knife, but not squashy or falling apart. Drain in a colander for 10 minutes, return them to the empty pot and cover.

To prepare the dressing, put the mustard, garlic, lemon juice, sugar and a pinch of salt and pepper into a bowl and stir until the sugar and salt have dissolved. Whisk in the oil to form a smooth emulsion. Cover and set aside at room temperature.

Now sear the lamb (you can do this up to eight hours ahead and keep it, loosely covered with clingfilm, in the fridge). Heat 3 Tbsp oil in a large frying pan or a heavy-based roasting pan until blazing hot and shimmering, but not yet smoking. Scrape the garlic, rosemary and lemon slices off the lamb (don’t leave a trace of garlic behind, as it will turn bitter in the pan) and season with a little salt on both sides.

Sear the lamb in the hot oil for 4-5 minutes on each side, or until nicely browned and caramelised. Cover and set aside (at room temperature if you’re planning to assemble the dish within two hours, or in the fridge if you’re preparing this well in advance.)

About 45 minutes before you’re ready to serve the dish, heat the oven to 190 ºC. Put the lamb in a roasting pan and roast for 20-25 minutes, or until it’s cooked through, but still a pale rosy pink on the inside (how long this will take depends on your oven and the thickness of the lamb; see Cook’s Notes.) Cover loosely with foil and set aside to rest for 15 minutes.

In the meantime, finely chop the mint leaves, stir them into the dressing and check the seasoning. Add a few tablespoons of water to the pot containing the potatoes, set it over a low heat and gently reheat for 7-10 minutes. Put the frozen peas into a pot of rapidly boiling salted water and cook for 3-4 minutes.

Cut the hot potatoes in half and arrange them on a large, warmed platter. Drain the peas and scatter them on top. Pour the pan juices that have accumulated under the lamb into the bowl containing the dressing and whisk well.

Cut the lamb into thin slices and arrange the pieces on top of the potatoes. Pour over just enough of the minty dressing to coat the potatoes and lamb, and garnish with small mint leaves. Check the seasoning and add more salt if necessary.

Serve immediately with a leafy green salad scattered with crunchy croutons.

With salad, serves  8-10.

Cook's Notes:

• It’s not difficult to debone a leg of lamb: use a very sharp knife to release the flesh from the bones, using long sweeping strokes. Don’t worry if the lamb ‘butterfly’ looks a little ragged: no one will notice once it’s sliced. If you’re not confident about doing this, have a look on the Internet for an instructional video.
• To test whether the lamb is done to perfection, cut a small, deep slit in the thickest part of the meat. If it’s still a bloody pink inside, let it roast for 5-7 more minutes, then check again.
• You can use large potatoes for this dish: boil them in their skins, taking care not to overcook them. Reheat them whole, then cut into thick slices.

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Gin-Cured Gravadlax with Crisped Capers

Here's the first in a series of recipes I've developed for Woolworths' revamped cookery-inspiration platform The Pantry, which has just been launched to tie in with their food sponsorship of the much-anticipated first series of Master Chef South Africa.

Gin-Cured Gravadlax with Crisped Capers

I'm excited to have been asked to be one of four official Woolies food bloggers for this reality TV series, and I hope you'll enjoy the recipes I'll be presenting once a fortnight over the next few months. (Note: I have been paid by Woolworths for these recipes: see footnote.)

This is a different version of my Gravadlax Tartare, using chives in the curing mix in place of the ubiquitous dill.

The chives give the salmon a delicate oniony note, but you of course can use dill, or any other herb you fancy.

It’s my guess that many of the cooks who didn’t make it through the first round of MasterChef auditions were marked down by the judges because their recipes lacked the interesting flavours so essential in a dish that is to be presented chilled. Putting together a cold dish with sensational tastes and textures is not as effortless as it may seem: with a hot dish, you at least have belly-comforting warmth on your side, so you can get away with less-than-thrilling flavours. Cold dishes, on the other hand, tend to numb the tastebuds slightly, so their flavours (and especially their seasoning) need to be a little more assertive.

This clean-tasting Scandinavian dish of cured fresh salmon is very easy to make at home in your fridge over the course of a day or so. Serve it plainly sliced with brown bread, butter and lemon wedges, or add a few interesting accompaniments, as I have done in the recipe below. You can slice this into thin leaves, or chop it finely as you would a salmon tartare, and serve it in a mound. Top-grade fresh salmon is expensive, granted, but there’s no need to buy whole fillets: this works just as well with two small salmon steaks if you’re serving four people.

Gravadlax is usually made with fresh dill, and sometimes vodka, but I use French chives because my family don’t like the aniseed character of dill, and gin because I love its distinctive juniper-berry taste (and, okay, because there’s always a bottle of it in my cupboard, and not always a full one, I might add).

Gin-Cured Salmon Gravadlax with Crisped Capers

2 fillets fresh salmon, skin on, weighing about 700 g
4 t (20 ml) coarse or flaky sea salt
1 T (15 ml) black peppercorns
4 t (20 ml) white granulated sugar
a large bunch of French chives (or fresh dill)
1 t (5 ml) finely grated fresh lemon zest
4 T (60 ml) dry gin

To serve:
3 T (45 ml) small capers, rinsed and drained
sunflower oil for frying the capers
fresh herb sprigs
8 bottled caperberries (optional)
a little olive oil
milled black pepper
½ cup (125 ml) home-made mayonnaise or crème fraîche
lemon wedges

Remove the pin bones from the salmon and cut away the dark blood-line. Place a fillet, skin-side down, on a large sheet of clingfilm. Using a mortar and pestle, grind the salt, peppercorns and sugar to a coarse powder and sprinkle it all over the salmon fillet. Finely chop half the bunch of chives (or dill, if you’re using it) and spread over the fillet. Sprinkle with the lemon zest and 2 tablespoons of gin. Place the other salmon piece flesh-side down on top.

Wrap the parcel tightly in clingfilm and weigh down.

Wrap the parcel tightly in clingfilm and, using a toothpick, prick the packet in a few places, top and bottom, so the liquid can drain away.  Place in a shallow dish and put a weight (a brick is ideal, or use tins from the cupboard) on top.

Refrigerate for 12 hours, then turn the parcel over, weigh it down again, and cure for a further 12 hours. Unwrap the parcel, remove the chives and wipe off the curing spices. Sprinkle the remaining 2 tablespoons of gin over the lower fillet, cover the remaining chopped fresh chives, replace the top fillet, wrap in new clingfilm and refrigerate, under a weight, for another 12 hours (up to 36).

To serve, remove the chives and curing spices and pat the fish dry with kitchen paper. Using a very sharp knife held parallel to the fish, cut delicate leaves. (Alternatively, you can strip away the skin and finely chop the flesh to serve it tartare-style, in a mound).  Don't add any lemon juice, as this will 'cook' the fish. Arrange the gravadlax slices on a platter and cover with clingfilm.

Pat the capers quite dry on kitchen paper and heat the oil in a frying pan. When the oil is very hot, drop them, a few at a time, into the hot oil and fry until they open up like the petals of a flower and are very crisp. Drain on kitchen paper and cool completely.

Scatter the fried capers over the salmon slices and add the herb sprigs and drained caperberries. Sprinkle with a little olive oil and grind over plenty of black pepper.  Serve the crème fraiche or mayonnaise in a separate bowl, or dollop it over the top.  Pass around a dish of lemon wedges and a basket of fresh, soft brown bread.

Serves 6-8 as a starter. 

Cook's Notes

• You can prepare your gravadlax up to 3 days in advance, but slice it no more than an hour before you serve it, and keep the slices covered with clingfilm. 
• For best results, buy the best-quality salmon you can afford. Second-rate or less-than-fresh salmon has an inferior texture that won’t hold up to the curing process. 
• Ring the changes by adding some interesting flavours to the curing mix: crushed juniper berries, pink peppercorns, coriander seeds, rum, whisky, grated raw beetroot, and so on. 
• How about a Thai-spiced gravadlax? Add lemongrass, ginger, lime zest, fresh coriander and a few drops of fish sauce to the curing paste (but don’t add any garlic, which will trample all over the delicate flavour of the salmon). 

Note: 

When Woolies invited me to be one of their official bloggers on their new My Pantry platform, I had to wring my hands while I considered the implications. I've never allowed any branding or advertising on this site (and the little banner on the top right of this page marks my first departure from this policy).  On the other hand, this was an opportunity I could not resist: the chance to hook on to what I believe will become one of the most successful reality TV series ever aired in South Africa.  My hand-wringing went on for hours about a minute and half, and then I said yes, because I'm proud to associate this blog with both Woolworths and the MasterChef franchise.

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