Lamb recipe

By Heraclitus

As you can probably infer from the picture, I got that digital camera I was mentioning a few weeks ago (by the way, apologies to our vegetarian readers). I bought it from this site, which was good, though they did try, successfully, to sell me a packet of accessories only a few of which I needed. In any case, now that it's in my possession, I promise to do everything in my power to make The Reaction one of those navel-gazing blogs that are all about what the bloggers ate for dinner. To wit:

Roasted Leg of Lamb

To those of you whose elementary butchering skills are better than mine, who own a sharper knife than I do, or who are just generally less lazy than I am (okay, that last group includes everyone), start with a leg of lamb and trim the fell (that stiff white coating), the fat, and anything else that's white (gristle, tendons, etc.). This, of course, can be difficult if the lamb is already in a net or webbing. I didn't do these things, and it cooked fine, but it would definitely be a more pleasant eating experience if the lamb were perfectly trimmed. In any case, once you've done that, put it in the tray. In a mixing bowl, combine the following:

1 tablespoon large grain sea salt, or 1.5 teaspoons of ordinary table salt
1-2 teaspoons of black pepper
1.5 tablespoons of rosemary
1 teaspoon mint

I usually always use a bit more of whatever spices a recipe calls for, but only a few shakes (you definitely don't want to be doubling the amount of salt in this, for instance). Add some olive oil to this mix, which will make it easier to spread over the lamb and will make it stick better. Somewhere between one-fourth and half a cup should be good. Rub the mixture (don't forget to actually mix it--look, this is a recipe for all levels of cooks) all over the lamb. Set the oven to 350 (make sure to let it preheat). If the leg weighs upwards of 4 pounds, cook it for 15-20 minutes per pound for a medium rare leg. If it's less than four pounds, go with 12-18 minutes per pound. Obviously, the sooner you take it out, the rarer it will be. I didn't have an exact weight for mine, but cooked it for about forty minutes. You can poke around at it; don't be alarmed if the blood runs red (I had red blood spilling out of mine at the slightest jab, but it was cooked all the way through). Unfortunately, I can't give you more precise times than those. Once you take it out of the oven, let it sit for about ten minutes covered (you can just fashion a crude dome out of tin foil if you don't have anything else). It's then ready to be served. It's delicious.