Roast lamb with fennel and chilli
This roast lamb with fennel and chilli is a spiced-up version of the traditional dish. It’s ideal for Sunday Lunch (especially at Easter!), particularly if you have guests around. If you have a bigger, full leg of lamb, just double up the ingredients for the paste. Serve it with roast potatoes and steamed vegetables.
Ingredients
Method
- Preheat oven to 220°C.
- Deseed and chop the chilli. Peel and chop the garlic. Chop most of the rosemary leaves.
- Using a pestle and mortar crush these roughly, then add the fennel seeds and season with coarse salt and ground pepper. Crush it into a coarse paste with the oil.
- Make 1 cm deep slits in the lamb, then rub the paste all over the meat. Sprinkle with the remaining rosemary and place it in a roasting tin.
- Put it in the oven for 20 minutes, then lower the temperature to 190°C.
- Pour the wine into the tin and some water, then roast for about one hour, depending how well cooked you like your lamb.
- Baste the lamb a few times during cooking and add more liquid (wine or water), if needed.
- When the lamb is cooked through to your liking, remove it from the oven, cover with foil and let it rest for 15 minutes.
- Meanwhile, make the gravy using the cooking juices, by adding a little cornflour, stock/wine/port and a spoonful of redcurrant jelly or cranberry sauce. Heat it up in the tin and reduce it to a thick sauce by stirring it with a wooden spoon and scraping up the sticky bits.
- Serve the lamb with vegetables and the gravy.