Roast Lamb Indienne

The aroma of the lamb while cooking is wonderful, and I like to baste the meat often with the juices in the pan to keep the un-submerged part of the lamb moist. The scoring really helps the marinade to penetrate the meat and gives some good crunchy bits on top.
An easy roast, full of punchy, Indian flavours and lots of juices to mop up with rice and/or naan bread.

The accompaniments are a family favourite for the Davies with Indian meals – slice ripe banana and toss with a few spoonfuls of desiccated coconut, find a mild mango chutney plus a hot one or a hot lime pickle, can keep yoghurt plain or toss in a diced cucumber that has been peeled and de-seeded. The combination of all three accompaniments takes the Indian meal to new heights.

"Based on a recipe from Australian Woman's Day July 4, 1966"– Erica Radich.

Pictured: Roast Lamb Indienne

1 leg lamb
3 tsp lemon juice
2 cloves garlic crushed
1 inch piece of ginger grated
1 tsp soy sauce
3 tbsp oil
1½ tsp turmeric
1½ tsp Madras curry powder
2 tsp salt
½ tsp pepper
½ tsp garam masala
Rice pilaf –
2 oz butter
1 small onion, chopped finely
1 cup of rice
1 ¾ cups boiling stock
½ tsp salt
1/3 cup sultanas or raisins
½ cup halved toasted almonds

Preheat oven 160°C.

With a sharp knife, score leg of lamb in a diamond pattern in cuts about ¼ inches deep - to help penetrate the beautiful flavour of the marinade into the lamb.

Combine ingredients and rub well into lamb - use any left over for brushing over lamb during the cooking process. Cover and allow to stand for 1 hour in refrigerator to let the marinade develop its flavours.

Place lamb into a shallow roasting pan, without rack. Pour 1 cup water into pan and roast in moderate oven for 2 ½ hours brushing occasionally with any extra marinade.

Rice pilaf - melt butter and sauté onion until soft and transparent. Add rice and cook until slightly toasted and tossed in oil. Add stock and salt and bring to the boil, then turn the heat down to a gentle simmer and cook covered for approximatley 20 minutes or until tender. Let rest for 10 minutes, then add sultanas and almonds.

Serve the lamb on a bed of rice pilaf, with accompaniments such as yoghurt or cucumber raita, banana tossed in dessicated coconut and a chutney such as the Apricot Chutney.

Serves 6

TasteTip – Packaged curry powder was probably a British invention. Hoping to recreate the dishes they had enjoyed in India the British probably took back with them some Indian spice mixtures. Indian cooks don't use one single spice mixture to flavour all of their dishes. Each dish will be flavoured with a different mixture of spices, called a masala, which varies from dish to dish and region to region. However, the curry powder that you can buy in the UK is usually a mixture of turmeric, chilli powder, coriander, cumin, ginger and pepper, and can be bought in mild, medium or hot strengths.

Basting - The process of spooning stock or fat over meat at intervals to prevent it from drying out during roasting. You can buy a bulb baster - a kind of large pipette - for the job. They're made of glass or plastic; although delicate, the glass one tends to be better because the plastic ones can melt if the liquid is very hot.