As of this past Friday, I had yet to cook a big meal in my new house, and so I decided that this was the weekend to do it, as next weekend I would likely still be polishing off Thanksgiving leftovers. I was originally going to do a boeuf bourguignon, however I procrastinated too much and thus ended up having to do something that didn't require either overnight marinating or an all-day cooking time.
I ended up with the following menu:
-Mustard and Pistachio crusted Rack of Lamb
-Carrot Ginger Reduction
-Potato and Onion Rosti
-Deep Fried Potato Skin Shavings
-Roast Asparagus
-Rosemary and garlic cornbread micro-muffins
In retrospect, I wish I'd added/changed a few things about this, but I'll save that for the end of the writeup. I will issue the disclaimer that this recipe was lifted partially from Patrick O'Connell of the amazing "Inn at Little Washington".
At any rate, rather than just show a picture of the completed dish, I thought it'd be much more interesting to actually go through and take pictures as I made it, in hopes of showing how easy it actually was.
The beauty of this meal is that everything cooks at the same oven temperature (400) and some pans are re-used, making for reduced mess at the end.
Everything starts with your mise en place as always, and there is a fair bit of that to do here. The first step is to shell and crack the pistachios for the crust on the outside of the lamb. This will go REAL fast if you have pre-shelled pistachios and a food processor, but I had to do it manually as I had neither. I shelled them by hand, cracked them with the side of a knife blade, and then further chopped them with the knife when I had a sizable pile:
The next step was to peel the potatoes for the Rosti. One big baking potato will yield 2 rosti each. You should obviously wash them off a little first, but this is still hardly rocket science. Reserve some of the peels for the shavings as shown:
The next step is to go ahead and make the batter for the muffins, as you can let it sit and then throw it in the oven later when you need it. I am a fan of "Jiffy" as it seems less greasy and more granular than some other corn muffin mixes. It's also about $0.50/box and available just about anywhere. Prepare the mix as shown on the box and then mix in a lot (almost a tablespoon)of dried rosemary and then a couple cloves of finely diced fresh garlic. If you want to roast the garlic first, that would be even better. At any rate, here's the box:
If I wanted to be really serious about it I'd have made the muffins from scratch and done it way in advance, but again, I put this meal together because I had to be able to do it all in a couple hours.
The next step of mise en place is to prepare the asparagus for roasting. Use ONLY fresh asparagus, and preferably as "jumbo" as you can find. The bottom of each stalk should be whiteish and somewhat woody, find the point where the stalk naturally breaks (i.e. where it becomes softer), break it, and then make it a clean cut with a knife. Use this point on the stalk for all the others, cutting with a knife:
You can see that I also peeled the stalks from about 2" from the top on down. This helps them to cook more evenly when roasting. Resist the temptation to peel with a knife and use a proper peeler as shown at the top, anyone with short of perfect knife skills (i.e. me) will just butcher the asparagus beyond recognition.
Next we're going to want to get our sauce going, which is a carrot-ginger reduction. This sounds exotic but it's really stupidly simple. The only ingredients are carrot juice (I used a single little bottle of Odwalla), a 1" piece of peeled fresh ginger root, a tablespoon of cooking sherry, and some heavy cream. Empty the carrot juice into the pot, add the peeled chunk of ginger, the tbsp of sherry, and let it reduce (i.e. boil down) on medium-high while you're doing everything else. Whisk it occasionally. Once it has reduced by about 2/3, remove from heat, discard the ginger, and let it sit.
This sauce can be made well in advance of mealtime, even up to a day or so. When you get close to time to eat, re-heat the reduction on low heat and whisk in a *tiny* bit of heavy cream, maybe two tablespoons, or roughly about 1/6th of the volume you have of reduced juice.
We'll want to get our potatoes ready for the rosti next. Rosti is a swiss dish that is eaten at all times of the day, and I encountered it while on a ski trip there. It's great for breakfast with ham and eggs on top, or for dinner with some braised beef and a rich sauce. In this case, we're going to lay our lamb on top. Rosti is very similar to a french potato galette. The idea is to first soften the potatoes and then shred them. We will soften by steaming (in my makeshift steamer) for 15 minutes, whole:
After softening, shred the potatoes by slicing each in half (the short way) and put them through the large holes on a grater, as shown:
The next step is to dice 1 medium onion finely (and a little salt & pepper) into the grated potato. Form the mixture into balls for frying:
Fry the rosti's in a fairly deep pan/pot in about 1/2" of standing hot oil. I used normal canola oil, but you can use whatever you prefer. Preheat your oven to 400 degrees before you start frying, so it will be hot by the time you're done (for other things). The oil should already be HOT when the cakes go in the pan. Immediately flatten each with a spatula and cook for about 7 minutes on each side, until golden brown:
Remove the cakes when browned on both sides and let them drain on a few layers of paper towels. Do NOT drain the hot oil just yet, as we're going to use it to quick-fry our potato peelings. Drop them in, let them fry until crispy (maybe 3-4 minutes) and then allow them to drain on paper towels as well. You may now drain the oil and turn down the heat, but you're going to use the pan again later to sear the lamb.
If I'd had any, I would've tossed the potato peelings in some truffle oil after they drained, but I was fresh out, so I just tossed them in salt and pepper.
Now would be a good time to toss the muffins in the oven. I use tiny dishes for the micro muffins, which also come in handy to plate an amuse bouche, but you can use whatever you want. I only had tiny dishes, so I put the rest of the batter in normal-size muffin tins (breakfast later in the week). Be SURE to use some Pam or oil or something to make sure the muffins don't stick. I used normal Pam just because I can spray it and it's quick.
Bake the muffins as directed on the mix box. Once the muffins are in the oven, we can finally attend to our lamb. The first step is to season the rack with salt and pepper:
We are then going to want to sear the exposed meat on the rack to give it a nice crusty char. The pan used for the rosti should still be on the oven, turn the heat up to medium-high and let it get hot. Turn your smoke vent on, as you're going to need the ventilation in a minute. Sear each exposed area of the rack on the hot pan for maybe 30 seconds per side. This would be each end, the exposed bottom (as in above picture), and then the back. It's easiest to move the rack around with tongs, holding it in each position, although it can just sit on the back when you're doing that side.
Once the rack has been seared, transfer it to a baking dish (I use a 2-piece grill pan to catch the grease) and throw it in the oven for about 20 minutes at 400 degrees. It's the same temp as the muffins and the asparagus, so if need be, it can all be in there at the same time.
When the lamb has been in for about 15 minutes (the muffins should be long done) it's time to throw in the asparagus. Transfer your prepped asparagus to a shallow pan, drizzle with a little olive oil, toss asparagus in oil to coat, and then just put the whole thing in the oven. Less is more here, especially if your asparagus is really high quality. You don't want to season it.
When the rack has been in for 20 minutes, pull it out, as it's time to do the pistachio coating. Mix a few tablespoons of dijon mustard with some brown sugar (to taste), and "paint" the mixture on the outside of the lamb rack (meat only, not on bones). This will allow us to "roll" the meaty part of the rack in the crushed pistachios to coat it. Sorry I don't have any pictures of this, but I had a lot going on at once during this part of the meal.
Toss the now-coated rack of lamb back in the oven for another 8-10 minutes. DO NOT OVERCOOK, the lamb should emerge medium-rare and delicious. My cooking times are for like a 1.4lb rack of lamb, adjust accordingly to size. You might want to toss your now-drained rosti on a cookie sheet and into the oven for the last 5 minutes the lamb is in there, just to warm them up and further crisp them.
When the lamb is done, everything should be ready for plating. The asparagus should be done about the same time the lamb is (check by tasting), and the muffins should have long-since cooled off.
Remove the lamb rack from the oven and let it sit for a minute or so before slicing. You will want to slice the chops off the rack individually between the bones. This requires a SHARP KNIFE. If you have a dull knife, the whole process will be very messy and the end result will not be attractive.
Now you should be left with sliced cooked chops, your asparagus, the rosti, the potato peelings, your sauce (now re-heated w/cream added), and the finished muffins.
The first step of plating is to place a single rosti on each plate:
Now place three of our beautifully-cooked lamb chops on top of each rosti:
Drizzle with a tiny bit of sauce (I used too much here). You'll want something that can pour very precisely to do the sauce otherwise it will look terrible. I used a milk pourer from a tea/coffee set:
Now put a bunch of potato peelings on top and our micro-muffins on the side for the completed dish:
As I said earlier, there are a number of things I would change when I do it the second time, and the plating is not least among them. Next time I will try to plate the chops upright, bones towards one another, with a little less sauce, maybe some micro greens, and maybe with the muffins on the side. I would also perhaps add the truffle oil to the potato shavings, garnish everything with a few whole pistachios, and maybe either plate the asparagus with everything else (I served it seperately this time) or do another vegetable to plate with the chops.
At any rate, the end product is pretty delicious. The crispy texture of the rosti contrasts beautifully with the medium-rare lamb, and the flavors of carrot, lamb, earthy potato skin, and pistachio complement each other pretty well.
