Easter and lamb are synonymous. Thanks to the Tri-Lamb Group we have gotten to try a variety of lamb dishes. We have used butterflied leg of lamb, lamb shanks, ground lamb and lamb shoulder. The one cut we haven’t tried is lamb chops. Lamb chops can from variety of places on the lamb. Lamb loin chops are sort of like mini T-bone steaks. They have a bit of the loin and the flank separated by a bone.

The nice folks at the Tri-Lamb Group offered to send us lamb loin chops. We checked with our downstairs neighbors, who make up the rest of Team Lamb, and they were game for hosting another lamb dinner. We all decide to have a practice Easter dinner or a… Preaster (Ha, get it?) We based our menu of this Easter one from Martha. However, instead of making Sugar Bunny cookies we went with turtles because that was the only cookie cutter we could find.

I received 10 lamb loin chops, which were beautifully cut and trimmed. I was excited to try cooking a new cut, but I was also a little nervous because it is also one of the most expensive cuts.

Pan frying, broiling or grilling are the best way to cook loin chops. If you have thick cuts, like we did, you are going to want to sear it first and then finish cooking it through in an oven or the cooler part of the grill.

I didn’t marinate the chops but instead covered them in salt and pepper. Don’t be shy with the salt. Make it rain! I let the chops sit with the salt on them for about an hour and then dried of the moisture on top with a paper towel.How did turn out? Amazing! It was the best lamb dish we have cooked so far. I really like the chops, they are full of flavor but not huge like a rib eye. Even with the best dish, you tend to burn out on a flavor. The last bites of a big dish are never as good as the first. These chops had a high impact hit that leaves you smiling at the end. Having the “bone-in” makes a portion seem larger in addition to adding flavor. While lamb is naturally lean meat, chops are a great cut that provides a portion that is full of flavor and not too large.

We had 10 chops for 6 people. That worked out perfectly. Most people had 1 chop but the hungrier guys ( me included ) had 2, with only one chop left over.

THICK CUT LAMB LOIN CHOPS

Ingredients:

• 4 – 5 Lamb Loin Chops, 1 1/2″ – 2″ thick
• Kosher Salt
• Ground pepper

SUGAR COOKIE BUNNIES

Ingredients:

• 2 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for surface
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 stick (1/2 cup) unsalted butter, softened
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 1 large egg, room temperature
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions:

1. Sift flour, baking powder, and salt together into a bowl. Beat butter and sugar with a mixer on medium-high speed until pale and fluffy. Beat in egg and vanilla. Reduce speed to low. With machine running, gradually add flour mixture; mix until combined. Shape into a disk, and wrap in plastic. Refrigerate until firm, at least 45 minutes (or up to 3 days).
2. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Transfer dough to a lightly floured work surface. Roll to 1/8 inch thick. Using a 5-inch-tall bunny-shaped cookie cutter, cut out cookies. Space 2 inches apart on parchment-lined baking sheets. Reroll scraps, and cut out. Refrigerate until firm, about 15 minutes.
3. Bake until golden, 12 to 15 minutes. Let cool completely on sheets on wire racks. Cookies can be stored in airtight containers at room temperature up to 1 week.

LEMON CAKE

Ingredients:

• 1 cup sour cream
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 2 teaspoons finely grated lemon zest
• 3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
• 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour, sifted, plus more for dusting
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature, plus more for pan
• 1 1/4 cups granulated sugar
• 3 large eggs plus 3 large egg whites
• Confectioners’ sugar, for dusting
• Borage or other edible flowers, for garnish

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Butter a 9-inch round cake pan. Line bottom with parchment cut to fit, and butter parchment. Dust with flour, and tap out excess.
2. Combine sour cream, vanilla, zest, and juice. In a separate bowl, whisk flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
3. Beat butter and sugar with a mixer on medium-high speed until pale and fluffy. Add eggs and whites, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in sour cream mixture. Reduce speed to low, and beat in flour mixture until just combined. Transfer to pan, and smooth top.
4. Bake until a toothpick comes out clean, 40 to 45 minutes. Let cool in pan on a wire rack for 5 minutes, then turn out cake onto rack to cool completely. (Cake can be stored in an airtight container at room temperature overnight.) Before serving, dust with confectioners’ sugar, and arrange flowers on top.

Our last attempt out making meatballs didn’t work out too well. The meatballs stuck to the pan and started to fall apart. That is not to say that results weren’t tasty, but it ended up looking more like a meat sauce than meatballs.

I used a similar recipe, it used panko breadcrumbs instead of bread, but this time I went with my well seasoned cast iron pan instead. I also chilled the meatballs for a bit in the fridge. I am not sure if these tricks helped, or if  I was just more careful, but this time the meatballs held together. The rosemary and lemon zest helped brighten up the dish. I doubled the recipe because I could only find ground beef and pork by the pound. Besides, who wouldn’t want having extra meatballs. The great thing about leftovers is that they freeze really well in sauce.

ROSEMARY MEATBALLS

Ingredients:

• 8 ounces ground beef chuck
• 8 ounces ground pork
• 1 1/2 cups panko
• 1 large egg, lightly beaten
• 1 garlic clove, minced
• 1 teaspoon finely chopped fresh rosemary or 1/2 teaspoon dried, plus more for garnish (optional)
• 1 tablespoon lemon zest, plus 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
• Coarse salt and ground pepper
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 4 cups homemade or store-bought tomato sauce

Directions:

1. In a large bowl, combine beef, pork, panko, egg, garlic, rosemary, lemon zest and juice, 1/2 teaspoon coarse salt, and 1/4 teaspoon pepper. Mix just until combined (do not overmix). Using a level 1/4-cup measure for each, form mixture into 12 meatballs. Note: Use a 1/4-cup measure per meatball to ensure uniform size. For easy cleanup, place on a sheet of parchment or waxed paper.
2. Heat oil in a large skillet with a lid over medium-high. Add meatballs; cook, turning occasionally, until browned, 10 to 12 minutes.
3. Tilt skillet away from you, and pour in tomato sauce. Bring sauce to a boil over medium-high; reduce heat to medium. Cover, and simmer until meatballs are cooked through, 8 to 10 minutes. Serve meatballs and sauce, garnished with more rosemary, if desired.

I can sometimes be a little aspirational when I shop. A great example is the supplies I got from King Arthur Flour a while back. I got special high-protein flour and malt powder so I could make bagels. Three years later, I finally got around to it.

I really shouldn’t have waited that long. While making bagels does take a bit of work, it is no harder than making bread and might be even more rewarding. Instead of making a loaf or two, you get a dozen bagels.

The high protein flour helps give the bagels some extra chew. Of course I am not sure how much of a difference it makes compared to bread flour. The Sir Lancelot flour from King Arthur comes in around 14%, while their bread flour is around 12%. The non-diastic malt powder, helps give the bagels their distinctive taste. Maple syrup or honey also supposedly works great too, but give it a different flavor. Non-diastic means that the enzymes in the malted barley have been deactivated and it just provides flavoring and color.

For toppings, I tried making my own Everything topping from dehydrated owns, which I toasted and rehydrated, poppy seeds, minced garlic and sesame seeds, along with some oil and salt. It tasted great, the only problem was that it didn’t stick too well to the bagels. Next time an eggwash might have helped. The sesame seeds had no trouble sticking by themselves though.

The dough is very dense. We have the big 6-quart KitchenAid, but it wasn’t too happy with all the mix and started getting pretty warm towards the end. Of course, it isn’t easy to knead by hand.

I used the recipe from Peter Reinhart’s Bread Bakers Apprentice book. It looks really complex, but it is actually just pretty simple… it is just exacting.

PETER REINHART’S BAGELS

Ingredients:

Sponge

• 1 teaspoon instant yeast
• 4 cups unbleached high-gluten or bread flour (see note below)
• 2 1/2 cups water, room temperature

Dough

• 1/2 teaspoon instant yeast
• 3 3/4 cups unbleached high-gluten or bread flour
• 2 3/4 teaspoons salt
• 2 teaspoons malt powder or 1 tablespoon dark or light malt syrup, honey, or brown sugar (see note below)

Poaching Liquid

• 2 to 3 quarts (64 to 96 oz / 181 to 272 g) water
• 11/2 tablespoons (1 oz / 28.5 g) barley malt syrup or honey (optional)
• 1 tablespoon (0.5 oz / 14 g) baking soda
• 1 teaspoon (0.25 oz / 7 g) salt, or 11/2 teaspoons coarse kosher salt
• Cornmeal or semolina flour for dusting

Toppings

• Sesame seeds, poppy seeds, kosher salt, rehydrated dried minced garlic or onions

Directions:

1. To make the sponge, stir the yeast into the flour in a 4-quart mixing bowl. Add the water, whisking or stirring only until it forms a smooth, sticky batter (like pancake batter). Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and leave at room temperature for approximately 2 hours, or until the mixture becomes very foamy and bubbly. It should swell to nearly double in size and collapse when the bowl is tapped on the countertop.
2. To make the dough, in the same mixing bowl (or in the bowl of an electric mixer), add the additional yeast to the sponge and stir. Then add 3 cups of the flour and all of the salt and malt. Stir (or mix on low speed with the dough hook) until the ingredients for a ball, slowly working in the remaining 3/4 cup flour to stiffen the dough.
3. Transfer the dough to the counter and knead for at least 10 minutes (or for 6 minutes by machine). The dough should be firm, stiffer than French bread dough, but still pliable and smooth. There should be no raw flour – all ingredients should be hydrated. The dough should pass the windowpane test and register 77 to 71 degrees F. If the dough seems to dry and rips, add a few drops of water and continue kneading. If the dough seems tacky or sticky, add more flour to achieve the stiffness required. The kneaded dough should feel satiny and pliable but not be tacky.
4. Immediately divide the dough into 4 1/2 ounce pieces for standard bagels, or smaller if desired. Form the pieces into rolls.
5. Cover the rolls with a damp towel and allow them to rest for approximately 20 minutes.
6. Line 2 sheet pans with baking parchment and mist lightly with spray oil. Proceed with one of the following shaping methods:
7. Method 1: Poke a hole in a ball of bagel dough and gently rotate your thumb around the inside of the hole to widen it to approximately 2 1/2 inches in diameter (half of this for a mini-bagel). The dough should be as evenly stretched as possible (try to avoid thick and thin spots.)
8. Method 2: Roll out the dough into an 8-inch long rope. (This may require rolling part of the way and resting if the pieces are too elastic and snap back, in which case, allow them to rest for 3 minutes and then extend them again to bring to full length. Wrap the dough around the palm and back of your hand, between the thumb and forefinger, overlapping the ends by several inches. Press the overlapping ends on the counter with the palm of your hand, rocking back and forth to seal.
9. Place each of the shaped pieces 2 inches apart on the pans. Mist the bagels very lightly with the spray oil and slip each pan into a food-grade plastic bag, or cover loosely with plastic wrap. Let the pans sit at room temperature for about 20 minutes.
10. Check to see if the bagels are ready to be retarded in the refrigerator by using the “float test”. Fill a small bowl with cool or room-temperature water. The bagels are ready to be retarded when they float within 10 seconds of being dropped into the water. Take one bagel and test it. If it floats, immediately return the tester bagel to the pan, pat it dry, cover the pan, and place it in the refrigerator overnight (it can stay in the refrigerator for up to 2 days). If the bagel does not float. Return it to the pan and continue to proof the dough at room temperature, checking back every 10 to 20 minutes or so until a tester floats. The time needed to accomplish the float will vary, depending on the ambient temperature and the stiffness of the dough.
11.  The following day (or when you are ready to bake the bagels), preheat the oven to 500 degrees F with the two racks set in the middle of the oven. Bring a large pot of water to a boil (the wider the pot the better), and add the baking soda. Have a slotted spoon or skimmer nearby.
12. Remove the bagels from the refrigerator and gently drop them into the water, boiling only as many as comfortably fit (they should float within 10 seconds). After 1 minutes flip them over rand boil for another minute. If you like very chewy bagels, you can extend the boiling to 2 minutes per side. While the bagels are boiling, sprinkle the same parchment-lined sheet pans with cornmeal or semolina flour. (If you decide to replace the paper, be sure to spray the new paper lightly with spray oil to prevent the bagels from sticking to the surface.) If you want to top the bagels, do so as soon as they come out of the water. You can use any of the suggestions in the ingredients list or a combination.
13. When all the bagels have been boiled, place the pans on the 2 middle shelves in the oven. Bake for approximately 5 minutes, then rotate the pans, switching shelves and giving the pans a 180-degree rotation. (If you are baking only 1 pan, keep it on the center shelf but still rotate 180 degrees.) After the rotation, lower the oven setting to 450 degrees F and continue baking for about 5 minutes, or until the bagels turn light golden brown. You may bake them darker if you prefer. (I had to bake them a lot longer… closer to about 25 minutes..)
14. Remove the pans from the oven and let the bagels cool on a rack for 15 minutes or longer before serving.

Notes:

Cinnamon Raisin Bagels: For cinnamon raisin bagels, increase the yeast in the final dough to 1 teaspoon, and add 1 tablespoon of ground cinnamon and 5 tablespoons of granulated sugar to the final dough. Rinse 2 cups of loosely packed raisins with warm water to wash off surface sugar, acid, and natural wild yeast. Add the raisins during the final 2 minutes of mixing. Proceed as directed, but do not top the bagels with any garnishes. When they come out of the oven and are still hot, you can brush the tops with melted butter and dip them in cinnamon sugar to create a cinnamon-sugar crust, if desired.

Most people are drawn to farmer’s markets by the fresh produce and unique heirloom varieties. Not me. I go for the bruised, blemished, overripe and sometimes ugly fruits and vegetables that get sold as Seconds. There are a lot of recipes where you want the highest quality, best looking ingredients. We first eat with our eyes after all.

However after 2 years of attempted gardening, I am quite well aware of the fact that not all vegetables grow perfectly. These imperfect vegetables don’t end up making it to your supermarket though. Instead they get turned into the canned soups and sauces that you find on the shelf. There are lots of good recipes that were designed for less than perfect vegetables though; and it is a waste use perfectly formed vegetables. It is also really expensive to use them.

Applesauce is a great example. I don’t have the exact math, but if you were to use perfect apples from the supermarket to make applesauce it would definitely be a lot more expensive than buying a jar. Luckily I was able to pickup about 4 pounds of seconds from the farmer’s market for $2. With the free labor I was able to get out of Elena, my applesauce was a bargin. It didn’t end up tasting too much different from Mott’s, but I thought the texture was nicer.

This is a great recipe to work on with kids. After you cut the apples, they can help stir them and watch as they soften. Of course the best part is mashing them. We have a food mill, which is a lot fun, but if you don’t you can just use a wooden spoon or potato masher. The advantage of the food mill is that you don’t have to peel the apples because it filters the skins.

Instead of using an corer, I like to use a melon baller. Simply split the apple in half and then use the baller to scoop out the seeds and the stem. It could be that I have only used cheap, dull corers… but the Baller Method flies in comparison.

[recipes]

APPLESAUCE

Ingredients:

• 3 to 4 lbs of peeled, cored, and quartered apples. (If you are using a food mill, you don’t need to peel)
• 4 strips of lemon peel – use a vegetable peeler to strip 4 lengths
• Juice of one lemon, about 3-4 Tbsp
• 3 inches of cinnamon stick
• 1/4 cup of dark brown sugar
• up to 1/4 cup of white sugar
• 1 cup of water
• 1/2 teaspoon of salt

Directions:

1. Put all ingredients into a large pot. Cover. Bring to boil. Lower heat and simmer for 20-30 minutes.
2. Remove from heat. Remove cinnamon sticks and lemon peels. Mash with potato masher.

I have always be jealous of the websites that have little thumbnails show up next to their recipes on Google. Turns out that you have to specially encode your recipes in order to do that. It is not too hard to do, you just need to provide extra context for Google about the different parts of a recipe. That helps search figure out what type of ingredients your recipe needs and what is a good photo for it.

You can of course do this all by hand… but that is a lot of work. Luckily, there are WordPress Plugins you can use that help. I found most of them to be clunky, so I took the recipe entry format I used on NoshBot.com and turned it into a WordPress plugin.

Recipe Schema is a WordPress Plugin that lets you easily enter and manage recipes on a WordPress site. It encode the recipe in the Schema.org microdata format, which is supported by Google, Bing and Yahoo. Recipe Schema also make it easy to print out the recipes and share them on Facebook.

Give it a try and let me know what you think. Is it useful? Any features you would like to see?

The Bitten Word guys came up with the most genius concept recently, cooking every recipe in 6 of the most popular cooking magazines…and we were a part of it!

The nice thing about challenges is that they push you to get outside of your comfort zone. This was true with the recipe we ended up with, Candy Bucket Cake from Food Network Magazine. There is no way under normal circumstances that I would have tried this recipe. It is pretty much the opposite of everything I look for in a recipe. First off, it serves 25-30 people. However, my main gripe is that it mostly consists of ready-made ingredients like cake mix and canned frosting, but still requires odd sized baking pans and fondant! When neither Target or Bed, Bath and Beyond have an 8″ cake pan or 6 cup Bundt pan, I think the bakeware is officially obscure.  I had to make do with a 9″ cake pan and a 12 cup Bundt pan, and I think our cake was a bit squatter because of it. And I only got one Bundt pan and reused it…who has 2 – 6 cup Bundt pans? Don’t even get me started on fondant. That stuff is pretty much impossible to find in DC. Most insultingly, the recipe was rated as easy.

This is not to say we didn’t have fun. It is hard not to when you are stack’n cakes together to form a massive pumpkin and then layering on the frosting. I just think the recipe authors sacrificed too much of the actual baking and are out of touch with what ingredients and equipment is readily available.

The recipe itself was pretty easy. All you are doing is adding 3 ingredients to a cake mix and then using a mixer. I will agree that this part of the recipe was easy. Since we were just using regular frosting instead of fondant, we didn’t get it as eye poppingly orange. The cut-outs in the fondant define the shape of the eyes and the mouth and, as you can see, they don’t look as crisp when they done with just frosting. While our cake may look a little demented, it was a lot of fun to put together and entertained Elena on a rainy day. Not to mention it was pretty tasty! I think the Bitten Word guys came up with a great concept, I just got a dud of a recipe.

[recipes]

The regular cake round that goes in between the 2 Bundts

The first of the Bundts

See the rounded top on the cake? You have to cut that off all the cakes to level them and make sure they fit together.

Done!

Ice it up…

Commence mating sequence!

Tada!

This is right about where things stopped looking like the magazine…

Just needs a face…

And this is how I learned that you should cut open cake mix bags instead of opening them like a bag of chips.

And this is what it was supposed to look like…

CANDY BUCKET CAKE

Ingredients:

• Cooking spray
• 2 18.25-ounce boxes spice cake mix
• 8 large eggs
• 2 cups buttermilk
• 2/3 cup vegetable oil
• 2 16-ounce tubs vanilla frosting
• Orange gel food coloring, for tinting
• Cornstarch, for dusting
• 12 ounces orange rolled fondant (available at craft stores)
• 1/2 cup dark chocolate frosting
• 2 long black licorice strings
• Snack-size candy, for topping

Directions:

1. Spray one 8-inch-round cake pan and two 6-cup Bundt pans with cooking spray. Beat the cake mixes, eggs, buttermilk and oil with a mixer; divide among the pans. Bake until a toothpick comes out clean, about 25 minutes for the round cake and 30 to 35 minutes for the Bundts; let cool.
2. Tint the vanilla frosting with orange food coloring. Trim the flat sides of the Bundt cakes and the top of the round cake to make level. Turn 1 Bundt cake upside down; spread with frosting. Top with the round cake, more frosting and the other Bundt cake, then frost the whole cake and chill 30 minutes.
3. Lightly dust a sheet of wax paper with cornstarch. Roll out the fondant on the paper into a 21-by-8-inch rectangle, about 1/8 inch thick. Cut into 12 strips, 8 inches long and 1 3/4 inches wide, tapering the ends as shown.
4. Attach the fondant strips to the cake, lightly pressing and smoothing them from the base of the cake upward. Refrigerate the cake 30 minutes.
5. Draw jack-o’-lantern eyes, a nose and a mouth on paper and cut them out; attach to the cake with toothpicks. Score around the cutouts with a paring knife, then remove the toothpicks and paper.
6. Trace the scored lines with the knife, cutting through the fondant and slightly into the cake. Pry out the pieces with the tip of the knife.
7. Cut a 1-inch-deep circle out of the top of the cake. Put the dark chocolate frosting in a resealable plastic bag; snip the corner and pipe the frosting into the cutouts.
8. Twist the 2 strings of licorice together and insert into the top of the cake to make a handle. Fill the top of the cake with snack-size candy.

Even though souffles have made my cooking resolution list for a number of years, I have been successfully putting them off. That is until one appeared in Real Simple. I mean if the name of the magazine is Real Simple, how hard could it be?

Luckily it delivered as promised. Mine didn’t rise as high as the ones in the photos, but it was really delicious. It is a bit much to just throw together if you are feeling like a dessert, but there is nothing particularly challenging about it. You can also mix everything ahead of time, throw it in the fridge and then bake it later… if you are that prepared!

We used it as an excuse to finally open this great bottle of dessert wine we brought back from Vancouver Island, Canada. It is the Brandenburg No. 3 from Venturi Schulze, which unfortunately is not imported to the US. We tried a glass while we were at the restaurant West in Vancouver along time ago. Each time either of us has gone back we have brought back a bottle, which has only been twice.

CHOCOLATE SOUFFLÉ

Ingredients:

• 3  tablespoons  butter
• 2  tablespoons  unsweetened cocoa
• 3  ounces  semisweet or bittersweet chocolate
• 1/2  teaspoon  vanilla extract
• 2  egg yolks
• 2  egg whites
• 2  tablespoons  sugar
• pinch salt
• pinch cream of tartar

Directions:

1. Heat oven to 375° F. Use 1 tablespoon of the butter to grease one 16-ounce or two 8-ounce ramekins. Coat the ramekins with the cocoa, tapping out the excess.
2. In a large bowl, over a pan of simmering water, melt the chocolate and remaining butter. Stir occasionally until smooth. Remove from heat and add the vanilla. Whisk in the yolks one at a time until smooth. Set aside.
3. In a clean bowl, beat the egg whites with the sugar, salt, and cream of tartar until stiff (but not dry) peaks form. Gently fold the egg-white mixture into the chocolate. Spoon into the ramekins. (The recipe can be made to this point up to 1 day ahead. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate.)
4. Bake until puffed and set, 40 minutes for a 16-ounce soufflé, 20 minutes for two smaller ones. (If baked directly from the refrigerator, add 5 to 10 minutes.)

It is a shame that parsley gets regulated to a garnish, it has so much more to offer. Chimichurri sauce helps demonstrate that, and it is fun to say. The sauce is from Argentina and is typically used on grilled meat. I have found works great on so much more than that though.

The parsley gives it a fresh green taste, while the vinegar and garlic back it up with some serious flavor power. A little bit definitely goes a long. It is good that it does keep relatively well in the fridge, although it does lose its bright green color. We used our batch on eggs and baked fish, both of which work out spectacular.

CHIMICHURRI SAUCE

Ingredients:

• 1 cup firmly packed fresh flat-leaf parsley, trimmed of thick stems
• 3-4 garlic cloves
• 2 Tbsps fresh oregano leaves (can sub 2 teaspoons dried oregano)
• 1/2 cup olive oil
• 2 Tbsp red or white wine vinegar
• 1 teaspoon sea salt
• 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes

Directions:

1. Finely chop the parsley, fresh oregano, and garlic (or process in a food processor several pulses). Place in a small bowl.
2. Stir in the olive oil, vinegar, salt, pepper, and red pepper flakes. Adjust seasonings.
3. Serve immediately or refrigerate. If chilled, return to room temperature before serving. Can keep for a day or two.

If you pay attention while you are walking around, you can find amazing things; in this case, a fig tree. I walk to Elena’s day care, and take a variety of routes. On one of these routes I noticed a large fig tree that overhangs an alley. Right now it is in full swing and there are tons of ripe figs. I am sure in California and Florida, it is pretty common to have urban fruit trees. In DC they seem to be pretty rare.

In the morning and on the way home, Elena and I pick up a “harvest” of figs. Fresh figs are great for snacking. As they get riper, they get sweeter and softer.

There are tons of different varieties of figs. Like apples you have to use a cutting if you want to propagate a variety. I have no idea what kind of fig tree we have “found”, all I know is that it is delicious. Do you guys have any ideas?

They are surprisingly good

I love getting cookbooks from the library. It makes it easy to try out new ones without having to worry about having an overflowing bookshelf. For our recent Mexican themed lamb dinner, I picked up Rick Bayless’s Fiesta at Rick’s. It is a great cookbook, with a nice focus on drinks and themed menus for parties. Unfortunately, there weren’t any lamb recipes I could use.

There was a great recipe for a Creamy Roasted Jalapeño Salsa though. It is a great sauce that is full of flavor but not too spicy. Honestly, it has a consitancy that is closer to a salad dressing than a traditional salsa. It was great on tacos, but since there were left overs I have tried it on eggs, sandwiches and burgers, all of which were delicious.

The garlic in it, helps emulsify it and make it into a creamy sauce. I made it in our Vitamix, which mixes the hell out of things. It has been over 2 weeks and it hasn’t come apart yet, impressive!

CREAMY ROASTED JALAPEÑO SALSA

From: Rick Bayless

Ingredients:

• 6 ounces jalapeño chiles (about 5-6), stemmed
• 10 garlic cloves
• 1/4 cup fresh lime juice
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• salt

Directions:

1. In a large skillet over medium heat, roast the jalapeños and unpeeled garlicuntil soft and blotchy brown, 15-20 minutes. 
2. Cool, then peel the garlic and roughly chopped the jalapeños. (you can remove some of the seeds, to control heat) Combine the garlic, chiles, and lime juice in a blender and pulse to finely chop. Turn blender on and slowly dribble in the oil. 
3. Pour into a small bowl and add a tablespoon or two of water to thin the salsa. Taste and add salt, about a teaspoon.

Notes:
This salsa is really best in the first 24 hours. You can keep it for a day or two, in the fridge- re-blend if it starts to separate.

We just heard back from the lamb folks… and unfortunately our most awesome Barbacoa Lamb didn’t win. The winning recipe for DC involves Indian spice and sounds pretty good. Thats ok, we still love lamb and had a blast. It was a seriously good recipe and you should try it. However, it wasn’t the only lamb taco recipe we made. The theme of the contest was healthy lamb and our second recipe was a little less healthy… but not that bad.

After reading this exhaustive post on Pork Carnitas I figured I had to give it a try with lamb. The results were amazing. The only real difference between the two recipes is that one uses water as the cooking medium and the other uses fat/oil. Here is the key quote from the article on why fat makes for better medium:

Foods cooking in a given volume of oil at a specific temperature will cook more slowly than food cooking in water at the exact same temperature.

No wonder the stock-braised pork was coming out dryer than the oil-cooked version: Oil is a much better temperature buffer than water.

I didn’t really change anything in the recipe, I just switched the lamb for the pork. The results were amazingly good. While the barbacoa was full of flavor, the meat was drier and more stringy. The lamb carnitas remained moist on the inside, crisped on the outside and separated into chunks. While it probably had more fat in it, the lamb carnitas was not greasy and the meat didn’t absorb it.

If you have the time, make both! If not, I would give the carnitas a try. While it wasn’t “healthy” enough to submit for the contest, carnitas isn’t that bad for you and is a fun and tasty twist on lamb. Of course it wouldn’t be a dinner with Team Lamb, if there weren’t fabulous desserts. This time it was blackberry pie, made with blackberries that we picked that morning, topped with homemade ice cream.

CRISPY LAMB CARNITAS

Ingredients:

• 1 medium onion
• 3 pounds boneless leg of lamb, rind removed, cut into 2-inch cubes
• Kosher salt
• 1 medium orange
• 6 cloves garlic, split in half
• 2 bay leaves
• 1 cinnamon stick, broken into three or four pieces
• 1/4 cup vegetable oil

Directions:

1. Adjust oven rack to middle position and preheat oven to 275 degrees. Split onion into quarters. Set aside. Season lamb chunks with 1 tablespoon salt and place in a 9 by 13 glass casserole dish. The lamb should fill the dish with no spaces. Split orange into quarters and squeeze juice over lamb. Nestle squeezed orange pieces into casserole. Add 4 onion quarters, 4 cloves garlic, bay leaves, and cinnamon stick to casserole. Nestle everything into an even layer. Pour vegetable oil over surface. Cover dish tightly with aluminum foil and place in oven. Cook until lamb is fork tender, about 3 1/2 hours.
2. Set large fine-meshed strainer 1 quart liquid measure or bowl. Using tongs, remove orange peel, onion, garlic, cinnamon stick, and bay leaves from lamb. Transfer lamb and liquid to strainer. Let drain for 10 minutes. Transfer lamb back to casserole. You should end up with about 1/2 cup liquid and 1/2 cup fat. Using a flat spoon or de-fatter, skim fat from surface and add back to lamb. Shred lamb into large chunks with fingers or two forks. Season to taste with salt. Refrigerate until ready to serve.
3. To serve: Place casserole dish with lamb 4-inches under a high broiler and broil until brown and crisp on surface, about 6 minutes. Remove lamb, stir with a spoon to expose new bits to heat, and broil again for 6 more minutes until crisp. Tent with foil to keep warm.
4. Meanwhile, heat tortillas. Preheat an 8-inch non-stick skillet over medium-high heat until hot. Working one tortilla at a time, dip tortilla in bowl filled with water. Transfer to hot skillet and cook until water evaporates from first side and tortilla is browned in spots, about 30 seconds. Flip and cook until dry, about 15 seconds longer. Transfer tortilla to a tortilla warmer, or wrap in a clean dish towel. Repeat with remaining tortillas.
5. To eat, stack two tortillas on top of each other. Add two to three tablespoons carnitas mixture to center. Top with salsa, chopped onions and cilantro, and queso fresco. Serve with lime wedges.

Notes:
For a healthier version, you can skip adding the fat from the cooking liquid back to the lamb before broiling.

Sometimes good things don’t have to come to an end. Carolyn and I were quite happy to hear from the Tri-Lamb Group that the Lamb Supper Club was going to continue and they were going to up the ante by adding a contest! This time, instead of providing us with a seasonal recipe, lamb and the necessary ingredients, they just sent us lamb and armed us with a $50 gift card. The challenge was to come up with an original, quick and healthy lamb recipe that was easy to prepare. The blogger with the best recipe wins an iPad! Game on!

We quickly called up our Lamb Crew and they were in, naturally. Due to travels it took a while to lock in a date, but that meant more time to craft the ultimate recipe. I present to you the Lamb Barbacoa Taco!

I know Mexican food may not be the first thing that jumps to mind when you think Lamb, but trust us on this one, it should be. The flavor of lamb falls nicely in between the more traditional pork and beef, and holds up well against the range of flavors you find in Mexican cooking.

Barbacoa is also a great preparation style for the boneless leg of lamb we were sent for the contest. Traditional Barbacoa is cooked in a pit, and wrapped in leaves. My recipe is closer to a slow braise, but the result is the same; tender, flavorful, morsels of meat. It is also very healthy. The long, slow cooking render the fat from the meat and breaks down the connective tissue.

Half the fun of having a Lamb Barbacoa Taco party is that each guest gets to customize their taco. The Lamb Crew of course went above and beyond and made everything from slaw, to mango salsa, to pickled red onions–even a batch of these amazing pickled zucchini! I will post about those next and include a bonus recipe for making Carnitas style lamb. While we used more traditional corn tortillas, you can use whole wheat ones if you are looking to be extra healthy.

There are two different cooking methods for this recipe–cooking the lamb in the stove in a dutch oven or using a crockpot. If you are using the crockpot, it is still good to keep an eye on it to make sure it doesn’t start to rapidly boil. The aim is a nice slow braise that is just below a simmer.

[recipes]

Aside from Kirin, Asahi and Sapporo, you don’t see much Japanese beer in the US. This is unfortunate, because Japan has a great craft beer culture. Every now and then, you can find Hitachino beer, but I have never been bold enough to fork over the $8 it cost for a bottle.

Lucky for me, I came across a really cool brewer at the Fancy Food Show, Coedo beer. I honestly don’t remember too much about it a month later, other than the face it was extremely refreshing after 8 hours of walking the show floor. I tried their larger, which was nice and balanced. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like they have distribution in the US. I hoping more Japanese beers become available in the US soon! They have a cool English site and an even cooler Japanese Magazine.

One of the interesting things I came across while at the Fancy Food Show, were a couple of interesting Japanese products that make cooking easier. I am fan of Japanese cooking, and since we have the awesome Hana Japanese Market around the corner I have no excuse for taking shortcuts. That said, it is better to take some shortcuts and still cook something, instead of just microwaving something.

This is very true when it comes to Dashi, the Japanese broth that serves as the base for many dishes. To make it yourself, you brew seaweed and bonito fish flakes. Like so many Japanese cooking techniques, there seems to be an infinite number of precise actions that need to be taken to make the perfect broth. Needless to say I have only done it once myself, and it wasn’t much better than the powder soup base I use. All of this is why I was excited to find this concentrated soup base, made from all of the real ingredients you would normally add. There were two type, Katsutsuyu and Shirotsuyu. Depending on the recipe you are making, you dilute it and using a differing amounts of water and use it as the base. Since I am lazy, I just used it as a broth for Soba noodles, which was quick and easy to pull together. The are a lot of better recipes here.

Another interesting product was Miso & Easy, which is a miso broth concentrate. Essentially it has the miso mixed with a little water and dashi in a covienent squeeze bottle. It of course makes it easy to make soup, but it also is great for a sauce on chicken, or pasta or in a salad dressing.

It may not be too popular in the US, but there is a Japanese style of curry. It is a bit more mild than Indian curry and the sauce seems a bit meatier, almost like a gravy. While it may seem a little questionable, the ready made curry I tried was actually really good. It comes in a pouch with vegetables already in it. You just heat and pour over rice. Better yet, it should retail for about $1.50 or so. I haven’t seen it in stores, but I am going to stock up when I do.

I have finally downloaded and digested the experience that is the Fancy Food Show. While the show is usually in NYC, for the past 2 years it was down here in DC. I covered and wrote about last years show. It was a totally overwhelming event. This year I arrived better prepared ( and wasn’t stuck in jury duty), but I still walked away overwhelmed.

The purpose of the show is to connect manufactures, importers, distributor and retailers or specialty food together. This show is essentially how all the cool things on you supermarkets shelf get there. But it goes deeper than that. This show is how lots of supermarket labels, like Whole Food’s get sourced, and how the treats inside an airplane snack pack get picked. It is an complex process that I don’t fully understand, but am totally curious about. There are not only domestic producers there either, about a third of the main show floor is international. There was a crazy amount of olive oil from all corners of the globe ( well, mostly from the Mediterranean).

One of the best parts of the show is getting to sample a wide variety of every imaginable kind of food. I literally spent 8 hours walking the show floor and was exhausted and stuffed at the end of the day. Tune in the next of couple weeks for my favorite finds.

Good bread takes time. There are lots of techniques and tools that can help take the labor out of making bread, but I have yet to come across a method that lets you speed up making a crusty loaf of artisan style bread. That is because it takes a while for the bacteria and enzymes to do their work and transform the flour and water into a delicious dough. Letting the dough or a pre-ferment rise overnight helps build the flavor and gives time for the yeast to slowly do their work.

The challenge is of course fitting the time good bread requires into your schedule. Just because good bread takes time, it doesn’t mean it needs to take a lot of time. The 5-Minute Artisan Bread technique is a great approach for fitting bread into you schedule. The techniques from the My Bread book also offers a great approach and I like the results a little more. I generally like to cook 2 loaves, since it doesn’t add that much extra work and once you have the oven going, you might as well. Bread freezes really well too.

Of course the challenge is fitting either of these techniques into your schedule. Both offer generally how long each step takes, but you have to do some math and planning to make it fit. This can actually be more of a pain than the actual baking. Fear not! I am going to share how I do it, so you can do it without having to think. Share your approach in the comments.

Night Before Baking

This will take about 15 minutes from start til end, including clean up.

• [ 10:00pm – 10:15pm ] Right before going to bed (which is roughly ~18 hours before you get home from work the following day), mix everything together as directed in the first step of the recipe below.

Baking Evening

This will take about 3 hours for a single loaf, 4 hours to cook two loafs.

• [ 6:00 – 6:20pm ] Right when you will get home from work, shape your loaves as directed in the second step (Takes 20 min, including cleanup)
• [ 7:20pm ] Roughly an hour after you have finished shaping the loaves, begin preheating the oven & dutch oven.
• [ 7:50 – 8:50pm ] Bake the bread as directed
• [ 8:50 – 9:00pm ] Return the pot & lid to the oven to get nice and hot again, if you are baking a second loaf
• [ 9:00 – 10:00pm ] Bake the second loaf
• [ 10:00pm – ] Leave both loaves sitting out over night to cool

AFTER WORK ARTISAN BREAD

Ingredients:

• 3 cups (400 grams) Bread Flour
• 1 1/4 teaspoons (8 grams) Table Salt
• 1/4 teaspoon (1 gram) instant or other active dry yeast
• 1 1/3 cups (300 grams) cool water (55 to 65 degrees F)
• Wheat bran, cornmeal, or additional flour for dusting

Directions:
The night before baking

1. In a medium bowl, stir together the flour, salt, and yeast. Add the water and, using a wooden spoon or your hand, mix until you have a wet, sticky dough, about 30 seconds. Mae sure it’s really sticky to the touch; if it’s not, mix in another tablespoon or two of water. Cover the bowl with a plate, tea towel, or plastic wrap and let sit at room temperature (about 72 degrees F), out of direct sunlight, until the surface is dotted with bubbles and the dough is more than doubled in size. This will take a minimum of 12 hours and (my preference) up to 18 hours. This slow rise – fermentation – is the key to flavor.

Evening of Baking

1. When the first fermentation is complete, generously dust a work surface (a wooden or plastic cutting board is fine) with flour. Use a bowl scraper or rubber spatula to scrape the dough onto the board in one piece. When you begin to pull the dough away from the bowl, it will cling in long, thin strands (this is the developed gluten), and it will be quite loose and sticky – do not add more flour. Use lightly floured hands or a bowl scraper or spatula to lift the edges of the dough in toward the center. Nudge and tuck in the edges of the dough to make it round.
2. Place a cotton or linen tea towel (not terry cloth, which tends to stick and may leave lint in the dough) or a large cloth napkin on your work surface and generously dust the cloth with wheat bran, cornmeal, or flour. Use your hands or a bowl scraper or wooden spatula to gently lift the dough onto the towel, so it is seam side down. If the dough is tacky, dust the top lightly with wheat bran, cornmeal, or flour. Fold the ends of the towel loosely over the dough to cover it and place it in a warm, draft-free spot to rise for 1 to 2 hours. The dough is ready when it is almost doubled. If you gently poke it with your finger, making an indentation about 1/4 inch deep, it should hold the impression. If it doesn’t, let it rise for another 15 minutes.
3. Half an hour before the end of the second rise, preheat the oven to 475 degrees F, with a rack in the lower third position, and place a covered 4 1/2 to 5 1/2 quart heavy pot in the center of the rack.
4. Using pot holders, carefully remove the preheated pot from the oven and uncover it. Unfold the tea towel, lightly dust the dough with flour or bran, lift up the dough, either on the towel or in your hand, and quickly but gently invert it into the pot, seam side up. (Be carefully, the pot will be very hot) Cover the pot and bake for 30 minutes.
5. Remove the lid and continue baking until the bread is a deep chestnut color but not burnt, 15 to 30 minutes more. Use a heatproof spatula or pot holders to carefully lift the bread out of the pot and place it on a rack to cool thoroughly. Don’t slice or tar into it until has cooled, which usually takes an hour.

These tools will make your life easier

Measuring ingredients by weight makes is much quicker because you can take big scoops and then just go slow at the end to get the precise amount

I bought a large 1lb bag of yeast from King Aurthur for $6 and store it in the freezer

It is easy to measure water using a scale. For water, 1 fluid ounce weights 1 ounce. So 1 cup weighs 8 ounces.

This dough hook mixes everything easily and cleans up quick. I also mix right in the plastic storage containers I let the dough rise in

After the first rise, the dough should have lots of nice bubbles and pockets

A shaker makes it easy to put down an even layer of flour and a mat makes it easy to clean up afterwards

The dough will be a little sticky, so a plastic bench scrape is great for getting it out

Flatten the dough into a disc and then fold one side into the middle

Repeat with all of the other sides, bringing them into the middle

Form a ball by bringing the edges together and pressing them together to form a seam

Flour the dough and place it seam side down on some wheat bran or cornmeal and cover with a floured cloth

After rising it should be nice, big and ready for baking

I am a big fan of seltzer and consume a fair amount of it in a week. Every where you go these days you see displays for SodaStream, so of course I was intrigued. For those of you who are not familiar, SodaStream is a gadget which lets you make seltzer at home. They also make a ton of flavorings which you can add, turning your seltzer into soda. Curios, I sent an email to them asking for a review unit. After a couple emails back and forth and a little bit of time waiting, a large, heavy package, festooned with dangerous looking warning labels arrived at my door.

The nice folks at SodaStream had sent me a unit to try out and keep, along with a ton of different flavorings to try. I am already on my second CO2 bottle, so I think it is fair for me to offer my views on it now. To be honest though, I have been putting it off for a bit because I am torn…

Let me start out with the positive. I really like it. It is great to be able to make up a bottle of seltzer when ever you want. I had previous been getting 6-packs of setlzer from Safeway and while we spend most of our money and a lot of our time there, I often found myself running out of seltzer. Being able to fizz up a bottle whenever you want is awesome. On top of that, it is just fun to do. It is a totally great thing to have. It is a rather compact, good looking, clean unit, that should be easy to store in most kitchens.

The unit is simply a large CO2 bottle that goes inside a sort of flimsy plastic structure which lets you inject CO2 into a chilled bottle of water. The bottle is a special one that is designed to go through multiple pressure cycles. It is not dishwasher safe though and could potentially burst the next time you use it, if you put it through the dishwasher. This is not a problem for use because we have plenty of bottle brushes. It could be a pain for others. Anyhow, once you have fizzed a bottle, you can now add a flavoring. It has to be done in this order. If you flavor then fizz, you could have a big mess on you hands. With the SodaStream you need to unscrew the bottle from the unit, and then screw on a cap. If there is flavoring in the water it makes it easier for bubbles or foam to form and causes things to shoot everywhere instead of staying in the bottle. This is sort of a bummer because I was looking forward to make my own flavored sodas. All is not lost though, you just have to make your own flavoring syrups instead and then dilute them into the seltzer water.

While there is a lot to like, it does have some flaws. The biggest is that it uses lots of proprietary components, which locks you into their system. This is all well and good, and there are other cooking systems where you have to buy consumables from the vendor.  The concern I have though is that system does not live up to the levels promised and you don’t find that out till you are already invested.

Since I was going to review it, I made sure I tracked how many bottles of seltzer I got out of the system. The packaging promised 60 1-liter bottles. I only got 28. This is a pretty significant difference and I was following the included directions and also using chilled water. So lets do a little math. The 60L (15oz by weight) bottle of CO2 costs $16.00 if you exchange your old bottle. If you truly got 60L of seltzer per CO2 bottle, that would give you roughly 169 12oz cans of seltzer… not too shabby. If you ignore the sunk cost of the machine and water, that is roughly $.09 a can.

However, if you actually only get 28L like I did you only end up with the equivalent of 79 cans at a cost of roughly $.20. At the Safeway near me a 6 pack of generic seltzer costs $1.50 or $.25 a can. If I bought cans of seltzer instead, it would cost $19.75 or a difference of $3.75. So there is clearly a savings, but not dramatic. The problem is that the Sodastream system is not free, you are looking at an average of $99. In order to back even you have to drink the equivalent of 2085 12oz cans. If it made 60L, you would be breaking even after the equivalent of 637 12oz cans.

Wow, that was a lot of math. Here is what it means to me. The Sodastream is still cheaper than buying seltzer. I didn’t have to buy it, so I am already saving money. If you did buy one and drink lots of seltzer, you would eventually start saving money. If you buy lots of soda and use and like the Sodastream flavors instead, you will start saving quicker.

For me though, I really just like being able to make seltzer. It is a lot of fun bubbling the water and you don’t have to worry about running out. That said, it would be nice if the refills were cheaper. The wholesale rate seems to be closer to $1 a lb if you buy it in  5lb or 20lb bottles, or about 1/15 the price. Some of that markup goes towards being to buy a safe refill of CO2, in convenient size, from a place nearby. If you are more adventerous and have a place to store a larger bottle of CO2, there are plenty of different gadgets out there to help you.

So there you have it, Sodastream may not save you tons of money, but it is fun and convenient and I like it.

Share Our Strength is a great organization work to help child hunger. Between last weekend and this coming weekend there are going to be bakesales across the country as part of the Great American Bakesale. Check to see if there is one near you, hopefully you didn’t miss it!

I am posting because I contributed this year to a bakesale in DC put together by local food bloggers. It is happening tomorrow ( Thursday 4/26 ) in Downtown DC. Here are the details:

DC Food Bloggers Bake Sale for Share Our Strength and No Kid Hungry.
Thursday, April 26 from 2-6pm
1150 15th St. NW, Washington, DC (Washington Post Building, 1st floor)

 

I baked Mexican Chocolate Chewies from theHomesick Texan cookbook. I got the book from the library and love it. This is the 3rd recipe I have made from it and they have all been great, I think I may need to buy a copy.

The “Chewies” are really more like meringues, with lots of nuts and chocolate in them, which is a great addition. Since there is no flour, I am pretty sure they are gluten free, the are definitely delicious. I couldn’t find the Chipotle powder the recipe calls for so I just copped up a couple of dried chipotles I got from Safeway. A minced chipotle from a can would work too.

Anyhow, stop by the bakesale and buy my cookies! Or some other tasty treats! Or visit your local “Bakesale” Or just a make a donation online, you don’t get cookies but you will be helping a great cause!

Lamb is of course the focus of our Lamb Supper Clubs. However, the apps, sides, desserts and drinks have all been getting more and more elaborate each time. Our final one, where we served Braised Lamb Shanks, was no exception.

This time we had two fabulous batches of bread, which were absolutely critical for sopping up all of the braised lamby goodness. I baked a very large country miche and someone else brought a couple of no-knead breads, cooked using the Cooks’ Illustrated recipe.

Even though it has been a mild winter, it is still winter. What better to take the chill out, than a nice spiced rum punch? Of course, having a real punch set only makes it better.

What makes a cheese (hello Humboldt Fog!) and pate plate even better? Why homemade crackers, made using Thomas Keller’s secret recipe of course!

You may remember this tiny tea cups from our last Lamb Supper. We used them to sample the variety of Greek Liquors we had all accumulated. Turns out they are also perfect for serving small samples of delicious squash soup. Pinkies up!

Of course a little greenery is always needed. This salad of butter lettuce, shined with grapefruit and sunflower seeds sprinkled throughout.

If I didn’t make it clear earlier… we had a lot of very good bread, and everyone was happy.

Clearly we went out of our ways to put together a complete meal. A meal wouldn’t be complete though without dessert and we went all out. We had apple galette, chestnut ice cream, hazelnut meringue cookies made with the left egg whites from the ice cream and chocolate dipped cherry biscotti. Better yet, the ice cream was made with candied chestnuts that from one of the guest’s family chestnut grove in France. Best of all, there were left overs so everyone left with a bag of cookies. I ate mine for breakfast.

I suppose it is only appropriate that the Tri-Lamb Group arranged for three Lamb Suppers. I am sad that we have reached the end though. Unlike the Godfather, the final chapter of this trilogy may have been the best!

The Braised Lamb Shank is an excellent winter recipe. The dish is warming and hearty, and very satisfying, even if DC’s winter temperatures are unusually high. Since this dish is finished with a long braise in the oven, it is also the perfect dish for a large crowd.

This was actually our largest dinner yet, with a total of 10 people enjoying delicious lamb. We had so many dishes that I am going to have to do another post to cover it all.

Elena wanted to help pitch in and used her toy knife to help “cut-up” the lamb. Very helpful indeed!

I always love to tinker with recipes, so I of course couldn’t leave this recipe alone. Instead of using canned beans, I made my own batch of canneli beans. Making your own beans makes it much easier to get a nice soft texture. You can also use the bean broth as part of the braising liquid, it is packed with flavor. To get the best possible texture, soak the beans the night before. Also add lots of salt to the beans.

One step that the original recipe left out is removing the silver skin from the shanks. The silver skin is membrane on that holds muscle groups together. It is pretty easy to remove, simply slide a knife between the muscle and the membrane and go to town! I also trimmed off most of the fat.

The first step was to salt and brown the meat. The recipe is a little optimistic on the amount of meat needed per person. We had eight shanks for ten people and we had one left over at the end of the night. It seems like a lot of meat, but the bones weigh quite a bit.

Since I was dealing with so much lamb, I used two dutch ovens, but I still had to do two batches.

After that you have to sauté the vegetables with the tomato paste and herbs. I went all fancy and diced everything. It was a pain. I am sure a good chopping or slicing would have worked just as well.

Finally you add the wine, broth, diced tomatoes and the beans. I also added in the bean broth. Once you add the shanks back in, it is time to get the dinner party started. All of the work for this dish is done, you just have to let it braise in the oven for a couple of hours.

One of the reasons that dish comes out so good is because it is cook with the bones. Having them in there adds a lot of body and flavor. It probably has something to do with the marrow or something like that. Either way it is good.

Our downstairs neighbors recently got a new puppy. Luckily one of the guests was extra thoughtful and brought lamb flavor treats. No one goes without lamb during a Supper Club!