I know lamb isn't a big thing in the US, but it's popular (if expensive) here in NZ. Anyway I traded for 1/2 a butchered lamb from a friend, and this is the good stuff.
So the usual way is to simply roast it, with some veges, and that's good. But I decided to try the slow cooker. Rubbed in some salt, pepper, thyme and garlic and sat in 2 cups of beef stock for the day. Ten browned for 2 mins in a hot oven, while making gravy from the slow cooker juice and steaming some veg and potato mash.
Yeah, this is the better way. Meat wasn't so cooked it fell apart, but almost, Super tender, nice gravy etc.
Seems the recipe also works for a pressure cooker if you are in a hurry, but I don't have one.
https://www.recipetineats.com/slow-cooker-roast-lamb-leg/
Personally I really like lamb but I'm fussy about it. I prefer it be from New Zealand and second best Australia. It has has a much better flavor than lamb from Canada or the US. Because of the price(I'm cheap) and that my wife doesn't like, it is an occasional treat.
Good lamb hard to find in Texas (go figure) but we grill chops, and when we can find a roast, do the slow cooker.
When I've had some lamb in Indian dishes and in Vegas at the high dollar buffet it was excellent
Deer 🦌 roast is some good eatin. And of course red wine goes with it. Or any beverage
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Over time in the USA, both goat and lamb have become far more popular-probably related to immigration and changes of taste to try things out. I see hardly ever in Walmart meat case but I do see many Hispanic meat cuts of beef, poultry and pork.
Speaking for my taste buds, I cannot stand the stuff! I don't even like it slathered in BBQ sauce. I check out the NYT's recipes daily and see lots of the "BAA" meats and dishes related to immigration from European, Asian, Middle Eastern and African countries.
AU & NZ don't move here much do they?
Curry dishes I really like, just not BAA! meats.
In Canada NZ'ers mostly move to Nova Scotia or British Columbia.
I'm sure your roast is good. But...
I find lamb to be too gamey, the local stuff I've tried anyway. Nothing beats a good beef, buffalo or moose roast. ;D
I recently had lamb chops in a Greek restaurant and they were very good although the meat has a unique flavor. The owner, a Greek, really knows how to cook! ;D Swamp, I'll defer the moose to you. I find it gamey and a bit tough yet many really enjoy it. I never had wild game growing up, my parents raised during the Depression wouldn't eat it.
Never had a gamey taste of moose yet, deer is too gamey for me. Might have had one piece of tough moose, but many pieces of tough beef. :D
My uncle (mom's brother) always said, "I cut my teeth on deer meat". My grandfather was a big game outfitter for probably 60 years. On dad's side, they were farmers and dad was no hunter, nor his father. Never had sheep nor goats. The neighbors had about 6 sheep regular for awhile, but I don't see any around now for at least 8 years.
For wild game I rate them this way
1 Elk
2 Moose
3 Deer but only from a hardwood forest, they have a much better taste.
I've never had Cariboo but would like to try it.
I rarely have lamb, its not easy to get and expensive.
I visited Turkey and the lamb dishes are very tastey.
Since then I have eaten at a lot of mediteranian restaurants and have enjoyed many different Lamb dishes.
I like Lebonese Greek and Turkish best.
Greek Gyros
Turkish Kebob and Kebop
Lebonese Kibbe ?sp
Our tastes are different.. what is "gamey" to one, not necessarily is to another.
As a kid, I cleaned out sheep pens... and to this day that whiff comes back to me when eating lamb or mutton. But some ways of cooking will be fine.
(agree, lamb was great when I was in Turkey).
Whitetail deer with bone and fat separated from the meat, does not taste gamey to me, but otherwise not edible to my taste buds. Eat at least one a year for the last 59 58 years (butchered my own after the first year). Made no difference if "corn fed" or in the cedar swamps of northern WI.
Bottom line, our tastes are just not the same.
Quote from: SwampDonkey on March 17, 2022, 10:30:55 AMI find lamb to be too gamey, the local stuff I've tried anyway.
Definitions of "lamb" vary from place to place. I see US regulations allow pretty much any meat from a sheep to the sold as "lamb", where as NZ "lamb" is from animals under 12 months old. So they are generally born early Spring and slaughtered in the Autumn, so they don't have to be carried over the Winter when feed is in short supply. After a year they are classed as "Hogget", and after that "Mutton". The meat steadily gets more flavour as the sheep ages. Still edible, but more of an acquired taste.
I like venison but was the only one in the family that would eat it. Same with elk.
The moose I've eaten are pretty much off the farm. Wild, yes. But they eat a lot of farm stuff, even soybeans. A moose would rather eat succulent veg than old woody stuff any day. :D
Farm raised, but wild. ;)
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Ian,
That looks and sounds good.
I was probably 35 y/o before I had lamb and it was roast and we were dinner guests of a co-worker who cooked it for Easter dinner. I ate it regularly in Saudi Arabia and in Indian/curry dishes and had some our Norwegian exchange student fed us they had raised when we visited her. I don't think I have had any I did not like although I have heard mutton is strong and not good.
I know one dish I ate a lot in Saudi was mutton/lamb backbones cooked in huge pots of rice - I'm talking 50-100 lbs of rice at a cooking. They had various spices then added shaved carrots and raisins on top. They would sort of "slice" through the steamed rice with a big spoon so you always got a measure of the carrots and raisins in every helping. That with fresh from the oven pita bread was a fine meal.
As to the "gamey" taste I still maintain that is mostly processing and cooking. I have fed many people venison, raccoon turtle or such and got rave reviews before they found what it was. These same people were adamant they did not like deer or small game and certainly not turtle.
As I have said before if you took a prime fat, beef yearling killed it, threw on the hood of your truck and drove around and showed it off a couple of days then hung and eventually gutted and processed it I bet you'd call that gamey too - and it would be.
I will always regret I never knew what they were or how to use many of those spices I saw and smelled in the open markets in the Mid-east and Africa.
Quote from: sawguy21 on March 17, 2022, 04:02:26 PM
I like venison but was the only one in the family that would eat it. Same with elk.
You were the smart one 👍
I like to think so ;D