D e l i s i o u c i t y

Oh dear,… I’ve been so busy with studies life that I’ve completely forgotten to edit and publish the draft of this post!  It has been sitting in my drafts dashboard for at least three weeks now. My sincerest apologies to friends who have been asking about waiting for the recipe of this dish on facebook – all I can say is, better late than never (*sheepish smile*). I also realize that as we are approaching the season of spring and gradually waving goodbye to the wretched cold and frosty winter madness, this lamb shank looks a little bit out of place. But I won’t feel too embarrassed yet, as winter is going away very very slowly at a rate worth being impatient about. Heck, I have been missing the sun so much, and the dreadful cold has certainly been affecting my mood and pace of work lately >_< But not to worry, I am very happy that the past couple of days has seen some glorious sunshine warming its way through the naked tree branches and cutting the nevertheless icy air. That’ll do it for now, I reckon. Anyway… back in Brunei and other hot places, people eat lamb regardless of the weather, so here you are, my personal take on the braised lamb shank ^_^

(apologies if u are a vegetarian or dislike red meat :-/)

Nikki’s Braised Lamb Shanks
www.delisioucity.com

2 pcs of lamb shank, cleaned and lean (!)
1 medium onion, diced
2 cloves garlic
some olive oil
1 carrot – diced
1 large potato – diced
1 stalk fresh rosemary
2.5 cups water
1 cup beef stock
3 to 5 Tbspn oyster sauce (careful, salty!)
Pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 200C. In a stock pot or dutch oven, heat the olive oil and add onions and garlic until fragrant and slightly caramelized. Add the shanks in and cook until slightly browned throughout. Take off from the heat. With the leftover olive oil, add the potato and carrot, oyster sauce, and beef stock. Let simmer and then add the shanks back in. Add the rosemary, and top up with water. Bring to the boil and then pop the stock pot, with lid, into your oven. You may cover the pot with aluminium foil too if the cover is missing. Set the oven to 3 – 3.5 hrs. Check every hour to stir the gravy and shift the lamb shanks about so that they get cooked nicely. By the end of 3.5 hrs you will get a beautiful fall-off-the-bone meat! Serve with toasted loaf slices, or yorkshire pudding.

Now you may notice the addition of the oyster sauce in the recipe. It is of course entirely up to you on that., but I can assure you it will not allude to the taste of bak choy in oyster sauce at all! I honestly didn’t have a clue how to make brown sauce and didn’t bother checking as this dish was made late on Saturday night on a whim, so I grabbed the next best thing (hehe) and it turned out to be a fluke. Was half dead by the time 3.5 hours was up. Oh but what a sensational way to enjoy Sunday lunch this was! Anyhow, I am very certain that there are a million other lamb shank recipes out there (most using alcohol though….) and perhaps most importantly, more traditional ways of making them. If you do get to try them or indeed have your own recipe, I’d love to know! For an absolutely professional take on brown sauce and other herbed things for example, you can look at our wonderful local talents from the brigade of Empire Hotel & Country Club at Chef Nash’s wesbite.

I really do appreciate you dropping by to this website despite the stalls and stagnations. Yes, all of you! Thank you!for your continuing support! ^_^

And happy gastroventuring! xxx