I don't ever recall having lamb when I was growing up, and tried making it once or twice as an adult. I think I did a leg. I was not impressed. A few years ago, I picked up some lamb chops on clearance as an impulse thing, and got hooked. I marinated and then broiled them (lemon juice, olive oil, chopped garlic, sea salt, rosemary, thyme, cayenne pepper.) For a while, they were on my regular meal rotation. I know that lamb makes its way to a select few tables around Easter, just as ham does. Does anyone else here like it and/or cook it...either holidays or "just because"? Got any favorite cuts or recipes? Now that I type this, guess what I have a hankering for?
Not really a fan of lamb. Try kid as an alternative. I find that kid is a little better and milder in taste. I butchered an adult male sheep once as he was too mean to keep around, and I made a whole lot of Italian sausage out of him. It was delicious!
That's pretty funny. I'm sure there's been more that one critter hit the dinner table that was extra-satisfying due to its own behaviour...you no longer have to ask "What the heck is eating him?" Those marinate lamb chops are pretty good. I think the larger reason is that both sides get the Maillard reaction from broiling, as opposed to being a slice from a roast. It's the same thing that makes a steak so very good. To me, roasted lamb is like eating marginal venison.
When I was a teenager, I had a friend whose family raised sheep, and my folks bought a sheep from them. I don’t remember how it got butchered and cut up, but probably there was someone in town that did that. I remember it was really greasy, and not bad tasting if you put enough ketchup on it. I think that I tried lamb, and was not impressed, but I didn’t know anything about cooking it, and it was many years ago. We used to have venison in the winter because my dad and Grandpa Bailey went hunting and usually each got a deer, and sometimes even an elk. I loved the taste of the venison, and my mom would cut it into strips (deer fingers ?) and we would flour and fry it like chicken. The elk tasted more like beef, to my memory. Once, we butchered a goat, and I guess it was okay, but again, I didn’t really know much about cooking it, and I think that it was tough and stringy. Probably too old of a goat. I know that a lot of the Hispanic people eat goat meat, and young goats are not cheap to buy anymore. I had bear meat once, too, and it was actually very good. Some people we were renting from had gone hunting and shot the bear, and they gave me and my husband a nice roast to cook. It tasted quite a lot like a pork roast.
i used to get lamb at a local restaurant run by a Korean woman and her soldier husband...it burned down and they left the area.....sozi t was a long time without it On my trip in April toes son inPa found a restaurant in CT on way home that had roast leg of lamb as a special so had it It was delicious
I have eaten a lot of wild game growing up, but I have never eaten bear! I haven't been hungry enough to go back to eating wild game again.......yet.
Goat, like sheep, has to be young to be good to the average American taste. We used to market to Filipino and Arab customers. The Filipino customers liked young goat and the Arab customers liked older sheep--preferably male with horns. My wife always tells people that the best and worst meat she ever had were both bear. Young yearling bear just out of the den is wonderful stuff and continues to be good unless they eat meat or fish. A fish-eating bear has meat tat is inedible even as sausage.
If it is truly lamb and butchered correctly, yes, I love lamb. Most of what you buy in the store is mutton or older sheep slaughtered without the necessary care required. Also on older sheep, the fat must be removed as it is what is most likely to pick up a bad taste. I have butchered old sheep that were very tasty, but I left a lot of fat and even meat on the hide. Removing the hide quickly and getting the meat either frozen or canned is important. Hanging it like beef or pork is a mistake. For either lamb or goat, I would cut as many prime back cuts as possible and then cut the rest in chunks and can it. Very tasty canned. I won't buy "lamb" from a grocery store. Spring lamb (mutton in my opinion) is over a year old while fall lamb is around 9 months. The difference is like smelling a freshly washed sock to a dirty sweaty one unless extra care and quick processing happen which it never does in a commercial setting. Goat is my favorite and they also require careful preparation and no hanging time. The biggest thing about goats is the lack of meat for the amount of bone. My favorite cut of either lamb or goat is a back cut and chops will be very small on fall lamb. For older animals, I would cut it for cooking in a soup because a large chop is much too tough. My favorite cuts of beef and bison are chuck and brisket cut into small roast and slow-cooked for 6 hours. My least favorite livestock meat is pork. My favorite cut of it is the chop. I don't care for either deer or even elk. Bear is seldom good around here even mostly plant and huckleberry fed. A big no on rabbits (even domestic), squirrels, opossums, muskrats, and rattlesnakes.
I've felt that was about deer (venison.) It seems that all the "Soak it in tomato juice" stuff is for the inedible gamey mountain deer that have been feeding off of acorns and roots, while the "OMG this is great!" stuff is lowland deer feeding off of corn and other agricultural crops.
No lamb. Just burgers. Seriously I had it in the past. Currently on my veto list currently along with veal and pork.
I've made veal chops with apples, cabbage and onions. I was edible, but not good enough to make a second time, although I do keep ground veal (and ground pork) in the freezer for meatballs and spaghetti sauces. What's your beef with pork? Pork is often cheap, and it's very filling.
I don't believe I've ever had lamb. Maybe at a restaurant mixed into something. I never ordered lamb specifically. Not on my bucket list. Reminds me... veal was on my father's veto list. He thought it was stupid (and I'm sure cruel too) to slaughter a not-full-grown animal of any kind for food.