Jellied Lamb

This jellied lamb dish was part of our Christmas feasting this year! Okay, maybe it doesn’t sound like the first dish on your list to be part of a special meal, but I had the lamb and the time, so Christmas dinner it was!

This recipe comes from Cook Away.

Ingredients

4 lbs lamb shoulder
2-3 bay leaves
Gelatin (I used 3 packets)
Parsley
2 hard-boiled eggs

Instructions

In a large pot, cover lamb with water. Add bay leaves. Simmer until meat is tender (about 2.5 hours). 

Remove the lamb, and let the stock cool. Chop lamb into small pieces. Skim the cooled fat off the stock (save for another dish!). Heat the stock to boiling again, and add the correct amount of gelatin (1 packet/tbsp per 2 cups, more for a firmer dish). 

Hard-boil two eggs. Place slices in the bottom of a loaf pan, along with parsley. Place the chopped lamb on top. Then pour in the stock with gelatin to fill the loaf pan. Refrigerate until firm. Unmold, slice, and serve. 

This was a fairly easy dish to make, even if it required a fair amount of forethought (~4 hours cooking/prep, and then refrigeration).

I got a frozen boneless shoulder, and just put the whole thing in to boil (after thawing it).

The lamb just hung out, simmering on the stove, while I did other stuff in the kitchen.

I must admit, I hardly ever make hardboiled eggs. I like my yolks runny. So, I unfortunately mis-timed the eggs and ended up with soft-boiled. Best. Mistake. Ever. I would do this again! Not as neat, but super yummy.

The final dish was pretty attractive! It probably could have used another hour in the fridge (not perfectly set at the very centre), but there were hungry people waiting!

I was a bit worried about unmolding it, but I ran a knife around the edges once and it popped out perfectly.

It was more colourful/vivid than I expected.

The verdict

Delicious! The gelatin/aspic had a delicious flavour and wasn’t too weird, and the whole thing looked and tasted great! I see why jellied everything was so popular for so much of the 20th century.

This would make a nice dish for a fancy picnic (or “Al Fresco meal”, as Cook Away calls them), or a cold luncheon. And, while the total time from start to finish was long, this was quite easy and didn’t require much monitoring, even when cooking. I’d definitely make this again.

Meat in jelly – what’s your take?