Easy Peasy Tasty Greek Style Roast Lamb. And Low Fat, Too (Lamb Recipes)

Member Name: mattygroves10

Product:	Lamb Recipes
Date:	24/03/06 (9967 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Easy, tasty low(ish) fat roast lamb. Yum

Disadvantages: Fairly expensive. No roast potatoes.

When I first came to the UK, I didn't like lamb. See, it's not such a commonly eaten meat in the US, and (probably more relevantly), my father didn't like it, so we never had it when I was growing up - and I mean never.

Upon emigrating to the UK, I discovered the Sunday Roast. The Sunday Roast was sometimes beef, sometimes pork, and sometimes lamb. At first, I'd only eat it if it was covered in an herby crust, and so its flavour was masked. As time went on, however, I learned to appreciate the stronger flavour of lamb, and now prefer it to the much blander beef roast.

Of course, we all know that roast dinners are not necessarily the slimmer's choice. Roast potatoes drown in fat, and the gravy includes the fatty juices at the bottom of the pan. Since I stopped smoking two years ago, my taste buds have regained their youthful acuity, but sadly, my waistline has expanded to an alarming degree. For this reason, I've been trying to cut my calories, without sacrificing the joys of flavoursome food.

I did briefly join Weight Watchers, but found the 'hallelujah amen' culture of the meetings a little bit too creepy (for my tastes [boom boom]). The cookbook I have, however, is excellent. There are lower fat versions of many favourites.

The concept for this recipe originates from a Weight Watchers cookbook. However, in time honoured fashion of cooks everywhere, I have amended, adapted and added to it to suit my tastes and that of my family. I have increased the amount of vegetable matter used, and added flavouring. I have also adjusted the cooking time to suit my oven.

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Ingredients:
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* 1 - 1.5 kg half leg of lamb
* juice of one orange
* 100ml red wine
* 1 bulb of garlic (yes, a whole bulb) separated into cloves, but left unpeeled
* 2 sprigs of rosemary
* salt & black pepper

* 1 or 2 onions, depending on size and hunger (I used red onions because I like them), cut into wedges
* 1 red pepper & 1 green pepper, diced (though I used a yellow pepper as well, and left the equivalent of one pepper just into chunks for variety)
* 1 aubergine diced (or 2 courgettes - that's what I used because we prefer courgettes to aubergine - and I diced one courgette, and cut the other into chunks.)
* 1 tin chopped tomatoes
* Squirt ketchup (the sweetness cuts the bitterness of the tin toms)
* Because I had it, I also used a few squirts of sundried tomato puree.

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Procedure
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Overture
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1. Preheat oven to 190C, or 170 if you have a fan oven
2. Rinse lamb, and pat dry with kitchen towel
3. Put the lamb into a roasting tin, along with the unpeeled garlic.
4. Pour over orange juice and wine, and lay the rosemary sprigs on top.
5. Season with salt and pepper.
6. Put it in the oven for an hour.

Intermission
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In the meantime, mix together the onion, pepper, courgettes and tomatoes. Squeeze a bit of ketchup (and anything else that takes your fancy, really.) I added some sun dried tomato puree, because I had it in the fridge, I read the ingredients and thought it would work. It did.

Underture
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1. After an hour, remove the lamb, and reduce the oven to 160C or 140 fan oven. Remove the garlic cloves, and squeeze the contents of some of them (around 4ish) over the lamb, and rub in.
2. Spoon the vegetable mixture over the top.

3. Cover with foil, ensuring there are no gaps. Put back in the oven for an hour or hour and a half. (The recipe said an hour and a half, but I found an hour ample in my oven - everyone’s ovens differ, however).

Encore
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Take the lamb out, and allow to rest (you may want to cover it in the foil on the board to keep warm). Although the recipe didn't call for this, I increased the heat of the oven to around 200 and put the vegetables back to get a bit of colour to them.

Carve and serve with a generous helping of the vegetable mixture. I also steamed some fine beans and served them on the side.

Enjoy!

Summary: An easy, one pot, lowish fat roast leg of lamb. Yummy!