BUTTERFLIED SHOULDER OF MUTTON WITH HERBS AND RED WINE

This came about from an esky full of mutton from my Dad who happens to be a sheep farmer, a yet to be used boning knife, and a recipe from Loukie Werle's Splendido book that I mentioned before. The recipe actually said lamb but lamb is grossly overrated. It's wooly chicken, a vehicle for sauces, as my friend Greg said, if you're going to have a Torana SLR5000 then have a bright green one. So anyway I had a shoulder of mutton sitting in my fridge and it was Sunday.

Boning is easy and, as a word, makes me laugh. Run the knife along the leg bone, cutting away the meat and then wrench out the shoulder - cutting as necessary. Not the tidiest job but aforementioned Greg's dog didn't mind. The shoulder is then a flat long piece of meat that usually gets stuffed and rolled but was left as is here.

I then olive oiled and peppered the meat. Into a mortar and pestle, I put the herbs I had in my garden - some rosemary, parsley, and a mangy bit of thyme and pestled them together with a couple of cloves of garlic. This gets smeared all over the meat and then the meat is wrapped tightly in glad wrap. This leaves the marinade with nowhere to go, rather than pool at the bottom of a dish. The book recommended 8 hours but I only had 4. The flavour gap was made up by sprinkling rosemary over it before roasting.

Popping in a roasting dish and roasted for 20 minutes at 200C. 180 after that - it was another 30. During this time I basted it now and then with red wine with some rosemary leaves that had been soaking in it. Rested it for 15 minutes wrapped in foil.

Gravy was made by deglazing the pan, reducing down some red wine, then adding some beef stock, followed by some cornflour in a bit of hot water to gravy it.

It was fantastic.

Accompanied by roast veges and broad beans

BROAD BEANS

I'm sure you're supposed to soak these overnight but I can never remember to do this so I just rinse then and then chuck them in a pot with some chicken stock, a bay leaf and some parsley. Brought to a boil and then simmered until mushy enough to eat.