Barbecue Lamb


I don’t know whether this is something that the Chinese would eat over New Year but to my mind this is one of the best and most celebratory of Chinese dishes. It is very like crispy duck but a simpler recipe and just as delicious. You can make the first stage well in advance and then finish it at the last minute. When looking at the ingredients do go to a Chinese supermarket, have a look around and ask for help if you need to. They sell the right ingredients, not an English version of them and that is why the food tastes authentic when made with them.


Ingredients


The Lamb

3-4 lb/1.5-2kg Half leg of lamb butterflied (ask your butcher to do this)

Thumb size piece of root ginger, peeled

3 garlic cloves peeled

2 tsp Five Spice powder (fresh as you can get)

1 tbsp of caster sugar

2 tbsp of yellow bean paste (buy in a tin from a Chinese supermarket, it is so much better)

A glug (couple of tbsp) of dry sherry or rice wine

2 tbsp of dark soya sauce

One onion (to cook with as a trivet)


The Sauce

6tbsp of yellow bean paste

2 tbsp of vegetable oil

2 tbsp of sugar

1 tsp sesame oil

The Wraps


Two leeks

Two iceberg lettuces

Half a cucumber


Start with the lamb. Peel the ginger and mix all of the ingredients, apart from the lamb and onion, together in a food processor until it is smooth. Put the lamb into large food bag, add the marinade and mix it around with your hands making sure it is well coated. Leave for 2 hours.


Place the lamb in an ovenproof dish on two halves of onion (like a trivet) and pour in the marinade. Wrap tightly with foil and place in a oven at 130 degrees for two and a half hours. Take it out of the oven and allow to cool slowly. Once cool take the lamb out of the dish and put it on a rack to dry out – an hour at least. Pat dry with paper.


You can now stop here and keep the lamb in the fridge for a couple of days.


Make the sauce. Heat the oil in a pan until it is warm but not hot. Add the yellow bean paste and stir for 2 minutes over a low heat. Stir in the sugar and a little water (a couple of tbsp) and stir for another minute. Finally add the sesame oil. Allow to cool.


Now for the wraps. Take the leek, cut off the white end and cut across the leeks about 5cm along. Save the rest of the leek for another day, we just want the white as it makes a great substitute for spring onion and this is much quicker to cut. Get the white 5cm end and cut through the grain, do this a number of times until you have small match stick lengths. Do this to the other leek. Place on a small dish. Take the cucumber and cut to 5cm lengths, halve it and scoop out the seeds, then cut the remaining cucumber into matchsticks and place on a dish. Get the iceberg lettuces. Take off the outer leaves and then carefully take the leaves off one by one placing them on top of each other on a plate. Put the sauce on a small dish.

For the final stage the Chinese would most likely use a deep fryer or the Mongolians barbecue it and both techniques are great. For me when not barbecuing (and to be honest I am a little addicted to my barbecue) a really hot oven serves this purpose really well. Heat your oven to it hottest and put the now dry lamb into the oven for 8 minutes. Take it out and cut it into bite size chunks on a board. You should get a crisp outside and hot shreds of lamb on the inside. Spoon the sauce, shredded leek and cucumber into a lettuce leaf, add chunks of lamb, fold up and eat.