Clay Outdoor Oven Roast Lamb Portuguese Style
Winter is here! The sun still shines, but it's cold out...what an excuse to use your oven for sunday lunch! Go on, be creative and try something new. Here is a delicious popular Portuguese one-pot recipe that my family back home uses, over seen by Avó (Grandmother) of course! This recipe uses lamb as opposed to goat which is a more popular meat used in Portugal for this dish.
Ingredients:
- 1 large onion, finely chopped
- 1 large head garlic (separate cloves, smash/crush with knife blade on side to discard the skin)
- 3 kg lamb shoulder - Trim off most of fat, cut meat into large chunks (In Portugal, we usually use Goat for this dish that's been soaked overnight in fresh lemon water to tenderise the meat first and also get rid of the strong taste that goat has)
- rock salt (Ample...we Portuguese love our salt)
- white pepper (black is ok if it's not in your store cupboard)
- 6 dried bay leaves
- sweet paprika
- 2 x 750 ml bottles red wine (or enough to cover the meat)
- 80 ml olive oil
- 1 bunch flat-leaf parsley ('Salsa' is used widely in Portuguese cuisine)
- 1 Lemon (or 3 Lemons if using Goat)
Method:
- If goat is used, leave it in a fridge or cool place overnight soaking in pot or bucket of water and the squeezed lemons. The next day, drain the water and pat the goat meat dry with a cloth.
- Distribute some of the chopped onion in the base of a large casserole pot, with some of the garlic and a first layer of lamb (or goat) chunks.
- Sprinkle (or pour) the rock salt, white pepper, a bruised (bash it) bay leaf and 1 or 2 teaspoons of paprika.
- Repeat the layers until all the meat is used.
- Pour in red wine so the meat is totally drowned then cover the pot and leave to marinate for at least 4 hours, unrefrigerated but in a cool place.
- Start the fire in your wood burning oven and wait for the flames to die down a bit and the temperature to reach around 180° C (more or less). Remember you can check the temperature by using one of the laser thermometers we sell for example.
- Before placing your pot in the oven check the wine level is over the meat... you may need to top it up as the meat will absorb some while marinade.
- Pour over the olive oil and toss the parsley stems on top and finally Cut the lemon into large slices and place on top.
- Spread some of the burning embers around the centre of the oven and place the pot on top of these.
- Close the oven doors and turn the dish every hour for equal heat coverage. It should take around 3 hours.
Enjoy a little taste of Portugal!