French Provincial Cooking - Elizabeth David [204]
The ingredients for a carbonnade nîmoise for four people are 2 slices of mutton or lamb cut from the leg, each about inch thick and weighing about lb., lb. bacon, 2 lb. potatoes, garlic, herbs, olive oil.
Lard the meat with little spikes of bacon and garlic. Heat a little olive oil in a large baking dish, put in the rest of the bacon cut in strips, put the meat on top, sprinkle it with salt, pepper and thyme or marjoram, surround it with the potatoes, peeled and cut into small squares, and put the dish, uncovered, into a hot oven for 20 minutes. Then turn the oven very low, Gas No. 2 or 3, 310 to 330 deg. F., cover the pan, and leave for 3 to 4 hours. By the time it is cooked most of the fat will have been absorbed by the potatoes, and the whole dish will have a typical southern flavour and smell. Sometimes other vegetables: onions, artichoke hearts, a tomato or two, fennel cut in quarters, carrots or aubergines, unpeeled, but cut into small squares, are added with the potatoes.
TRANCHES DE MOUTON À LA POITEVINE
MUTTON STEWED WITH BRANDY AND GARLIC
Have two thick slices cut from a leg of mutton, with the bone, weighing about lb. each. Brown them in butter in a heavy shallow pan with a well-fitting lid. Salt and pepper them; pour over about 4 fl. oz. of brandy or marc (see page 92) and the same amount of water. Add a dozen peeled cloves of garlic. Cover with paper and the lid, lower the flame, and cook as slowly as possible for about 2 hours. There will only be a little concentrated juice when the dish is ready, but the mutton will be very tender with a highly aromatic flavour. You can, of course, use less garlic if you like, but some there must be. Almost any root or dried vegetables go well with this dish, either braised or plain boiled, or in a purée.
Slices of shoulder of lamb can be stewed in the same way, allowing 1 to 2 hours’ cooking time. There should be enough for four.
ÉPAULE D’AGNEAU BOULANGÈRE
SHOULDER OF LAMB BAKED WITH POTATOES
‘She was a capital cook; and her method of boning and rolling up a shoulder of mutton like a large Bologna sausage was a mystery which cost me a considerably long post-prandial lucubration to penetrate.’
GEORGE MUSGRAVE, writing of the Hôtel du Louvre at Pont-Audemer in A Ramble Through Normandy, 1855
The boning and rolling of a shoulder of lamb or mutton is not really such a mystery as it seemed to George Musgrave; any decent butcher will do it for you, and the system certainly does make the joint very simple to carve. This particular way of cooking a boned shoulder owes its name to the fact that, like the carbonnade nîmoise, it was a dish which would be prepared at home and carried to the bakery to be cooked in the oven after the bread was baked. It makes an excellent and quite economical dish for a large household.
The boned shoulder will weigh about 4 lb. Press salt, pepper, chopped fresh thyme or marjoram, and for those who like it, garlic, into the inside of the rolled meat. People who like the flavour of garlic without wishing to find it in the meat might try putting a clove or two under the joint in the pan while it is cooking. In this way it will flavour the gravy and the potatoes, but will scarcely be perceptible in the meat itself. Personally, I find a little garlic with lamb as indispensable as others find mint sauce.
Melt an ounce of butter and a tablespoon of oil in a large pan; brown the seasoned meat in it. Transfer it to an oven dish; put in the garlic and 2 Ib. of whole new potatoes. In the same fat fry a sliced onion until it turns golden;