Garlic Rosemary Lamb Chops with Potato and Tomato Gallettes and Roasted Asparagus with Lemon,
The Midwestern Gentleman and I enjoyed a simple, cozy dinner together on Easter Sunday. While I know ham is a popular Easter choice, I always find myself craving lamb on this spring holiday. One of my absolute favorite (and anti-inflammatory) preparations of lamb is to slather lamb chops with a garlic rosemary paste and broil them. It’s the simplest entree imaginable, but the taste will make your family or guests feel very special indeed. (On Sunday, I made half the recipe as written, and the Gent lamented on Monday that we did not have any leftover lamb. This, from someone who generally prefers not to eat red meat.)
Potato and Tomato Gallettes
To accompany the lamb, I roasted fresh, spring asparagus spears with olive oil, lemon zest, and kosher salt. A quick squeeze of lemon juice when the roasted asparagus comes out of the oven finishes the dish nicely. I also assembled these Potato and Tomato Gallettes from Martha Stewart Living (September 2005), which look impressive and labor intensive, but were actually a cinch to prepare — are you sensing my Easter cooking theme?
Moist, gluten-free/dairy-free carrot cupcakes
Finally, for dessert, we test-drove my new recipe for addictively delicious, moist, gluten-free, dairy-free, low-sugar carrot cupcakes drizzled with caramel-cashew icing. I know “low sugar” doesn’t usually accompany “addictive” or “delicious” as a dessert modifier, but I promise that these nutritious cupcakes packed with healthful goodness like pecans, dates, and shredded coconut will bliss out your tastebuds without spiking your blood sugar. (Recipe to come in a later post, once I make a few final tweaks.)
Garlic, rosemary, and kosher salt minced together. Adding the salt during chopping helps grind up the garlic and rosemary, releasing even more aromatic oils than chopping alone.
In the meantime, here’s the easiest, tastiest way I know to prepare lamb.
Garlic Rosemary Lamb Chops
8 large cloves fresh garlic
1 tsp kosher salt
several sprigs fresh rosemary
3 to 4 Tbsp avocado oil (or another monounsaturated oil with a high smoke point)
freshly ground black pepper, to taste
6 lamb loin chops
Peel and coarsely chop the garlic and rosemary. Sprinkle with kosher salt, and continue to mince into a coarse paste. Put the paste in a small bowl and stir in avocado oil, or another monounsaturated oil with a high smoke point, such as grapeseed oil. (Please note that olive oil is not stable to cook with at broiler temperatures.) Add black pepper to taste.
Slather the garlic rosemary paste on both sides of the lamb chops, and let them sit out on the kitchen counter until the meat comes to room temperature (in my case this took about an hour).
Preheat the broiler. When hot, broil the chops about 6″ from the heating element for 6 to 8 minutes. Flip the chops over and broil for another 3 to 5 minutes for rare (less time) or medium rare (more time). Let rest for a few minutes before serving.
