Chocolate with salt

The other day we asked at an other butchery for rib eye and got minute steak instead. Sometimes I get the feeling, that I'm overwhelming the people with my inquiries.

Why am I telling you that, because it's the same story with the rack of lamb. I'm telling the butcher, I want a rack of lamb, so the ribs of a lamb. He's immediately correcting me, trying to convince me, it's the back. Well, I didn't want to fight, I asked him, if I could at least get the back in french cut. Two days later I picked up a very badly butchered back of lamb. It took me half an hour to clean the piece of meat half decent, so we could eat it more or less easily. Don't get me wrong, they are very obliging, cut in the bones a bit, to make it easier for us to eat, but they have no idea, what I'm going to do with the meat, that makes it difficult to get it prepared the right way.

After  I discovered a beautiful Namibian food/travel blog, The Curious Kitchen, and their post about a crusted rack of lamb, I decided on crusting my back of lamb too. But my way.
And I discovered, that I definitely need to work on my  pictures. Does anybody know of a food photography course in Windhoek? And what butcher is he using? Dear Christi, if you read this, please give me a shout.

But now back to my back of lamb; I finally found use for my almond butter and it made my crust heavenly.

I struggled a bit with the cooking time of the lamb. By the time the picture was taken, the lamb was still raw inside, so it had to go into the oven for an other period of time. I was so afraid to overcook it, that in the end I undercooked it. Or at least my piece. But in the end we were so hungry, that we didn't want to wait any longer. The cooking time in my recipe is not the one I took, obviously, but the one I'm sure it'll work perfectly. Sometimes I should just trust my guts.

Nonetheless the dish was very successful, all the flavors worked really well together and as already mentioned, the crust was just yummy.
Ingredients (for 2)

1 kg back of lamb, french cut

4 medium potatoes
1 tbsp thyme
butter

250 g green beans

salt
pepper
oil

For the crust:

25 g fresh bread crumbs
40 g freshly grated Parmesan cheese
1 clove garlic, finely chopped
1 small onion or shallot, finely chopped
1 tbsp thyme
1 tbsp rosemary, finely chopped
1 tbsp parsley, finely chopped
50 g almond butter

Bring the potatoes unpeeled to boil and cook for 10-15 minutes.

Mix all the ingredients for the crust together. It's easier, when you slightly melt the almond butter. Put aside.

Prepare the back of lamb, by cutting off the excess fat and sinews, rinse under cold water and pat to dry.

Preheat the oven to 200°C, heat from above.

Cover the exposed bones with kitchen foil, season the meat with salt and pepper.
Heat some oil in your pan and seal the meat by searing it quickly from each site. Keep the pan for later.

Put the lamb into the oven for 10 minutes, then take it out again and spread the crust on the meat. Put it back into the oven for another 10 minutes, if you like your lamb medium - rare or accordingly longer. Leave for an other 5 minutes to rest; I always leave the meat in the oven with door slightly open, so it doesn't cool down too much.
At this point I must also say, that I took my lamb out the fridge at least 2 hours before preparing, so my meat had room temperature when I started working with it. If you cook with lamb directly taken out the fridge, you'll maybe need to adjust the time in the oven.

While the lamb is in the oven, bring salted water to boil and cook the beans to your liking.

Peel (not necessarily) and slice the potatoes. Heat the pan again, add some oil, if necessary and put the potatoes in. Sprinkle thyme all over, season with pepper and fry the potatoes on high heat till crispy. Shortly before they're ready, season with salt and toss them in butter.

Drain the beans and put them on the plate, together with fried thyme potatoes and back of lamb.


Enjoy!