Any french or italin rack of lamb recipes?

RACK OF LAMB WITH ROASTED NICOISE VEGETABLES AND HERBED RICE


- Suggested cut, Rack or Easy Carve Leg


- Serves 4-6





Tied together with string, racks with their shorter roasting time makes ideal mid-week roasts. Accompany with colourful vegetable mixes of eggplant, zucchini, tomatoes or potatoes.





NICOISE VEGETABLES:


- 1 tablespoon olive oil


- 1 brown onion, peeled and chopped roughly


- 500g zucchini, sliced


- 750g small potatoes, quartered


- 3 tomatoes, peeled and chopped roughly


- 1 teaspoon of fresh thyme leaves


- 1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh parsely


- salt %26amp; freshly ground black pepper





LAMB:


- 2 racks of lamb, each approx 8-10 cutlets in length, trimmed


- a small handful of fresh thyme


- salt %26amp; freshly ground black pepper





TO PREPARE THE VEGETABLES:


Heat the olive oil in a large frying pan, ans saute the onion, zucchini and potatoes together for 5 minutes over a medium heat. Add the tomatoes, thyme, parsley, salt and pepper and cook for a further 5 minutes. Transfer the vegetables to a raosting tin.





TO COOK THE LAMB:


Preheat the oven to 220C. Sprinkle the lamb racks with thyme, then season and place on top of the vegetables. Cover the tops of the racks bones with aluminuim foil to prevent charring. Roast the racks for 10 minutes, then reduce the temperature to 180C and roast for a further 20-30 minutes for medium rare or longer if required. Remove from the oven and rest the racks, covered loosely with aluminium foil for 5-10 minutes.





TO SERVE:


Serve with Herbed Rice (recipe follows)


Slice the racks into cutlets and serve with nicoise vegetables and Herbed rice.





HERBED RICE:


- 260g long-grained rice, boiled and drained


- 1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh parsely


- 2 teaspoons finely chopped fresh marjoram


- 2 teaspoons finely chopped fresh thyme


- butter


- salt and freshly ground black pepper





Combine drained, hot rice with the herbs and a little butter and place in a serving bowl.Any french or italin rack of lamb recipes?
You've hit a soft spot there, I think I am the world's biggest lamb rack addict. Here's an excerpt from my recent blog post on the topic (you might want to visit the blog for more info, plus info on how to make your own mint sauce http://www.angiejudge.com/archives/58). It's not exactly 'french' or 'italian' but here in New Zealand we have one of the highest sheep to people ratios (and are a major exporter of lamb racks) so we all think we're the reigning experts on the issue.





There are any number of ways to prepare and cook lamb cutlets and we have successfully grilled them on the barbecue on more than one summer鈥檚 evening. If you鈥檙e after a quick meal, cook them in the pan like a steak, a few minutes on either side will do (only once per side, don鈥檛 keep turning the meat). But with a little extra time up the sleeve, I always prefer to roast my lamb.





When roasting, one option is to pat a crumb coating on top side of the lamb racks by mixing an egg with some (preferably fresh) breadcrumbs, a grainy mustard and a few herbs. Don鈥檛 bother with dried herbs, you might as well just be shaking more salt in your meal. If you don鈥檛 cook with fresh herbs currently, try it. Once you go fresh, you never go back!





Roasting a rack on its own isn鈥檛 a bad idea either. No matter how you cook a lamb rack, it is always best to keep the cutlets together (don鈥檛 chop them up individually until after the cooking is complete, it will help to keep the moisture in). Start by marinating the cutlets in a little olive oil (no need for the extra virgin for cooking, any old olive oil will do), a few herbs and loads of cracked pepper, with a little salt too. I chose rosemary and thyme, but any woody herb that marries well with the lamb flavours and will withstand a roast will suffice. Marinate as long as you like, the longer the better. This weekend I marinated 4 lamb racks, 16 cutlets in total, cooking half that evening and leaving half in the fridge for the next night.





After marinating (and again, skip the marinade if you鈥檙e short on time), roast the cutlets until pink in the middle and crisp on the outside. I don鈥檛 tend to add much olive oil to the pan, maybe a tablespoon or two.





Peel and chop your vegetables to roast. This time I chose three varieties of New Zealand sweet potato, kumara. The blend of colours looked spectacular on the plate. The kumara is a fascinating vegetable, at the center of theories tracking the pre-European New Zealand Maori people in their journey across the Pacific Ocean. Originally, it was thought that the kumara linked Maori through Pacific Island cultures back as far as South America, however recent discoveries through the kumara have also linked Maori into the mountainous areas of Asia.





Roast the vegetables at 180C until crispy on the outside and soft on the inside (about an hour for most potato varieties). The meat will take a little less time, so give the vegetables a head start by 20 - 30 minutes. Test cut into the meat when you think it might be done to make sure it is cooked to your liking.





To accompany the meat and kumara I also chose peas, boiled and mixed with a little mint from the garden and a knob of butter for flavour, a perfect match when serving lamb with mint jelly.