Slow-cooked Shoulder of Lamb with Thyme & Mint

1 Preheat oven to 200°C (400°F). Remove as much fat as possible from the lamb. Take time to do this as it will affect the finished dish. Mix butter, salt, pepper, thyme, mint and coriander seeds together in a bowl, then spread all over the underside of the lamb with a knife. Put lamb on a rack in a large roasting tin buttered side down and spread the rest of the seasoned butter over the top of it.

2 Roast for 30 minutes to colour the top, then remove from oven. Carefully transfer lamb to a platter, remove rack, pour off the fat in the tin and wipe out the tin with paper towels. Return lamb to roasting tin (without the rack) and pour around white wine and water. Add carrots and onions. Lower oven heat to 150°C (300°C).

3 Cover lamb first with baking (parchment) paper, then tightly with tin foil (the baking paper will stop the lamb sticking to the foil and tearing it), or cover dish with a lid if it has one. Return lamb to oven and bake for 4 hours (or up to 5 hours) without disturbing.

4 Remove lamb from oven and lift off foil and baking paper. Transfer lamb to a heated platter and keep warm covered with the paper and foil. The vegetables will be extremely tender, but still delicious, so serve them separately if you wish. Tilt the roasting tin, leave it for a minute or two, then scoop off the fat, or if you have one of those fat separator jugs, pour the stock into it.

5 Serve lamb on the platter. Shred with a knife and fork, pour over some of the juices and dish onto heated plates. Pour remaining juices into a heated serving jug and serve immediately.

Recipe Notes

A fat separating jug lets the stock flow out through a low spout while keeping the layer of fat above it. It’s a very useful piece of kit.

Here is what I recently wrote about slow-cooking a leg of lamb which applies to both a leg and a shoulder of lamb:

I highly recommend you cook this the day before you want to serve it, and here’s why: dinner will be cooked, and that’s a plus! But more importantly, chilling the lamb after cooking will allow the fat to settle on top of the juices where it will set in the cold and can then be scooped or scraped off. Fat from the lamb can also be removed. These steps improve the dish immensely.

Here’s what I did for a recent birthday feast. I cooked the lamb ahead and the next day I removed the fat. I was then able to remove some of the bones so the meat would fit in a slow cooker. In fact, I was able to fit two legs of (boned) lamb in a slow cooker. Guests were invited for noon. All I had to do was let the lamb legs gently heat and bubble away in the slow cooker for 2 hours. There isn’t an easier way of serving a fabulous hot meat dish to a crowd.

To make it even more special, I served the lamb on baba ghanoush – charred eggplant purée – and topped the lot with pomegranate seeds.

If time is a bit short, cook the lamb for 5 hours only, cool it quickly, and finish off the next day as described (remove fat, remove big bones and finish cooking in the oven or in a slow cooker). Why not do the whole thing in a slow cooker? A leg of lamb will not fit, though a shoulder will. Both cuts need browning first to make them appetising, and they need excess fat removed (especially the shoulder), then cooking, chilling, de-fatting and gentle reheating, to be successful. Importantly, slow-cooked lamb needs to be served PIPING HOT on a hot plate, with everyone ready to tuck in as soon as it is served. *The leg of lamb was cooked for 7 hours at 130°C (250°F). Recipe here 7-hour Spiced Lamb. I chose to cook the shoulder in the recipe above in the oven as I wanted to brown it in the oven first, so it saved switching over, but you could certainly transfer the lamb to a slow cooker for the bulk of the cooking if you prefer.