spring CSA week 4, and awesome lamb pot roast

Last week’s pickup: potatoes, green beans, apples (six Stayman, six “Red”), three beets, three grapefruit, mushrooms, eggs, a bag of spinach, eggs, bread (Breadery sourdough), and a bonus item. I picked apple butter. The other choices were horseradish mustard, salsa, or applesauce.

spring CSA, week 4

In previous years, Breezy Willow offered a bonus item (usually preserves, honey, or cheese) once a month, in place of eggs. This year it’s along with eggs. I’m pretty happy about this, because we really got in the rhythm of a certain number of eggs per week, and the monthly egg interruption threw us off a little every time. Also, yay for a true “bonus” item.

Last night I threw a bunch of CSA root vegetables in a Dutch oven with a big hunk of lamb from Wagon Wheel Ranch (unfortunately I didn’t look at the label, so I’m not sure what cut it was), some Guinness, and lots of stock and flavorings. It turned out phenomenal, so much so that I burned my tongue going back for second tastings straight out of the oven. Great for cold-weather cooking. Hey, if it’s going to snow outside (at the end of March!), I’m going to turn on the oven.

Snowy Sunday Lamb Pot Roast

A good hunk of lamb, bone-in, I think it might have been leg?, 4-5 lbs
1 gigantic carrot, cut into chunks
2 small yellow onions, chopped
5 stalks celery, chopped
6 large garlic cloves, peeled and crushed
5 medium white or yellow potatoes, cut into chunks
1 1/2 cans of Guinness, about 28 oz
1 (14-ounce) can diced tomatoes in juice
1 cup lamb stock, though beef or chicken would do fine
1 beef bouillon cube
generous pinch dried thyme
generous pinch dried rosemary
2 bay leaves

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

Pat the lamb dry with a paper towel, and season all available surfaces with salt and pepper. Sprinkle flour over entire chunk of lamb. Coat the bottom of a large Dutch oven with olive oil and warm over medium heat. Add the roast and sear each side for 4 to 5 minutes, or until nicely browned. Remove the roast to a large plate.

Add more olive oil to the Dutch oven. Add the carrots, onions, celery, and garlic, more salt and pepper, and cook over medium heat for 10 minutes or so, stirring occasionally, until carrots are cooked but onions aren’t browned. Add the potatoes and Guinness and bring to a boil. Add the tomatoes, stock, bouillon cube, herbs, and bay leaves. Bring it back to a boil, put the roast back into the pot, and cover. Put the covered pot in the oven for 2 1/2 hours, turning the heat down to 250 F after about an hour, until the meat is nice and tender, with an internal temperature of over 140 degrees. (Mine was 200 degrees when I finally checked it, but it was almost meltingly tender.)