I like breast...lamb's breast.

And you thought I was being dirty!

Lamb's breast (also called lamb ribs/riblettes in the US) are a very under used cut of lamb. It's cheap, but very fatty, so can be a bugger to cook.

There's all sorts of recipes for braised or boned breast, but not too many for bone-in, roasted. I found this on the web when I was looking for recipes and, being oven roasted, I was all over it.
 

Ingredients:

3 lbs breast of lamb

1 tsp whole cloves

¼ cup honey

¼ cup lemon juice

1 tsp salt 

Method:

Preheat oven to 325°.

Place lamb breasts on rack in shallow roasting pan. Bake 1 hour and 45 minutes. Drain off excess fat. 

 

Combine cloves, honey, lemon juice and salt; then pour over lamb. Bake about 20 minutes more.

I served the lamb with braised cabbage and slow roasted vegetables.

Slice the cabbage as thick or thin as you like. Melt a tablespoon of butter in a medium sized saucepan over medium heat, add the cabbage, cover and turn heat to a lower setting. Stir the cabbage after a few minutes to ensure it gets coated in the butter. Keep stirring the cabbage every few minutes until it it soft, then take the lid off the saucepan and allow it to "dry" on a low heat, stirring every now and then, until there is some colour on the cabbage.

 

Slow roasted vegetables

Ingredients:

1 tsp sage

1 tsp thyme

1 tsp rosemary

2 cups cubed sweet potato

2 cups chopped carrots

2 cups cauliflower

2 cups cubed parsnips

2 cups cubed potato

2 cups cubed butternut

Method:

Preheat the oven to 325F (160C).

Peel the sweet potato, butternut, potato, carrots and parsnips and cut into cubes.

Cut similarly sized pieces of cauliflower.

Place all the veggies in a large roasting pan. Season with salt and pepper. Add herbs.

Roast at 325F covered in aluminum foil for 30 minutes. Stir vegetables.

Cook another 30 minutes. Stir vegetables again.  

Place back in the over, uncovered this time - checking every 10 minutes until done (should be fork tender).

So there you go. It takes a while to cook, but is very much worth the effort.

A word of caution, the lamb breast is VERY fatty as it consists of layers of meat and fat. You will have to remove the layers one at a time if you don't want to eat the fat.

This dish is not for the health conscience, unless you only have it about once every 6 months or so.

Enjoy!

Matt