Our Favourite Lamb Dishes for #LoveLambWeek 2017
Aside from those who’ve adopted a meat-free diet, who doesn’t love a succulent leg of lamb or a tender lamb shank?
And while you might think a large number, you might be surprised to learn that, according to the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board (AHDB) – the organisation for beef and lamb levy payers in England, fewer people over the past 15 years are regularly eating lamb.
In fact, AHDB says that while those aged over-55 “make up the lion’s share of the market, time is ticking for lamb”.
In response, a campaign drive called Love Lamb Week was started in 2015 “to help unite all who Love British Lamb, from producers to consumers, and to give a boost to the great local businesses” who support this industry.
With #LovelambWeek falling between 1st – 7th September this year, we’ve selected a number of memorable restaurant lamb dishes, personally enjoyed by us over the past few years, to celebrate this very British meat (Note: it’s always best to contact a restaurant to make certain the dishes below are still on the menu):
Lamb Shank £16.00
We have to begin with this moist and tender, slow cooked lamb shank by The Banc in North London’s Tottenham, which we had the pleasure of trying earlier this year.
This stunning dish not only offered a rich and buttery meaty sauce that effortlessly combined with the creamy bed of mash to offer a most pleasurable eat, but the meat practically fell away from the bone at the slightest touch.
Couple that with the firmness of the turnips on the side, and what you have here is a complete dish that we still salivate over to this day.
With a varied and imaginatively conceived menu, The Banc deserves a visit for its many other lamb dishes.
Braised Lamb Shank – Served with mashed potato, £18.00
When Tarshish in Wood Green said that their Braised Lamb Shank has been “cooked up to four hours”, you better believe it, particularly after managing to pick up this year’s British Kebab Awards for Best Newcomer Restaurant/ Takeaway in London.
Apart from being impressed by this 500-seater restaurant’s lavishly designed interior, it was the absolute tenderness of this slow braised lamb shank on the bone that left us slack jawed.
With a vibrant tomato and mixed vegetable sauce that had bags of flavour, sweet soft carrots and a bed of mash, we wouldn’t get enough of this hearty, flavourous lamb dish.
If you haven’t visited Tarshish, then go experience what it certainly succeeds in representing, an “east meeting west in a marriage of modern aesthetics with traditional sentiments”.
Read FtL’s reviews of Tarshish here.
Lamb with Szechuan Sauce, £26
Situated on the fifth floor of London’s iconic luxury department store, Harrods, and in the company of some of the world’s leading fashion brands, contemporary Chinese restaurant Chai Wu presented French trimmed lamb chops that were sublime.
As soft, juicy and succulent as you’d ever want, and with a thick sweet-chilli Szechuan Sauce, these chops had the most incredible meaty taste to them.
Read FtL’s reviews of Chai Wu here.
Lamb Rack £19.95
Located on the ground floor of Debenhams’ flagship Oxford Street store in Central London, and boasting a menu created by none other than 2014’s MasterChef winner Ping Coombes, Chi Kitchen certainly impressed us with this Lamb Rack from its Robata BBQ dishes.
The subtle sweet bean sauce was divine and went perfectly with chops that were ever so soft, juicy and tender.
This dish mesmerised us for its simplicity and its execution, and is one that needs to be tried to be believed.
Read FtL’s reviews of Chi Kitchen here.
