Among the many things with which I am familiar but, on closer examination, about which I know next to nothing, is the Bible. I undoubtedly absorbed more from Cecil.B,DeMille’s version of Biblical events than I did from the hours of instruction, through which I day dreamed, by raw boned Jesuits who were determined by hook or by beating to inculcate into me the cant and dogma that made their own lives so very miserable. However, I do remember plenty of interesting culinary tidbits from the good book. I’m sure there was a mistake in the ingredient list of loaves and fishes as I think that the amount mentioned would only feed 6-8….well worth remembering should you have invited 5,000 or so to come round for a bite. Chocolate seems to have been missed out completely in the chapter about Easter but they do mention a very French sounding Pascal the lamb….God alone knows how many he was meant to have fed, but it’s probably as exaggerated as the loaves and fishes episode. Here in France, where State takes precedence over religion, they’ve changed Pascal’s name to Gigot…well, they named his back leg Gigot…and that’s what I cooked on Chocolate Sunday ( sometimes spelled with an “e”) to celebrate the rabbit that was born from an egg.
Gigot and English Roast Leg of Lamb are, biologically, one and same thing and there the similarity ends. There is no “well done” gigot, nor is there the need to serve it with mint sauce and redcurrant jelly or with a selection of 4 or 5 different vegetables. The “pile it high” concept of Sunday lunch is not the way of Gigot. The following recipe from Stéphane Reynaud’s “Ripaille” would be a very good introduction to those who have not eaten Gigot as it should be…the beans are a magical combination. I often use haricots cooked in goose fat which work quite as well.
Today I have been eating leftover cold lamb on warm chunks of baguette which is another thing altogether and which I should blog about on another occasion.
Food, Photography & France 
Perfect! Definitely no mint sauce for my lamb. You seem to have turned out quite well in spite of the raw boned Jesuits; theirs must have been a miserable life, along with the Ursuline nuns who made my formative years rather miserable. But what’s past is past, and I shall toast to that with a glass of Pauillac.
Cheers…our daughter was with the Ursulines…and survived:)
I went to an Easter Sunday lunch with about 16 people for lamb some years ago and our host tried the Jesus trick with a tiny lamb shoulder. Needless to say we got a lot of roast potatoes and vegetables with gravy. Evidently the Jesuits must have had a hand in this!
I did try a recipe which involved slow cooking lamb with butter beans for a few hours (a while ago), but I prefer it pink and not falling off the bone. You’ve got the right idea – cook the beans separately 😉
I agree with that plan….we can buy really good beans in goose fat at the supermarket…definitely a thing to take back to England if you’re visiting France.
…and the big tins of duck confit 😉
…such a great product…
I love my lamb any way (apart from dried out!) slow cooked or pink – but this looks absolutement parfait!
The dreaded grey lamb and wet vegetables are still in my memory:)
Looks like it was the perfect Sunday lunch.
It worked out well:)
You used thyme and garlic – delicious – but no rosemary?
There’s definitely rosemary sticking out of that lamb leg 🙂
That’s what I thought – but then wondered if thyme could also look like that if well oiled!
Only if Roger cut all the little leaves off and made bunches 😉
Very tiresome plan:)
🙂
That’s a gold star for you, young MD:)
🙂
No, I used rosemary and anchovy fillets:)
Even better!
🙂
I love gigot too, but I’m going to break a lance for mint sauce. It’s delicious with lamb. Pas de question!
Maybe it’s just because I haven’t eaten it that way for so long:)
Gigot over roast leg of lamb any day: have made it with the white beans but not used as interesting a recipe which does not say ‘rosemary’ anywhere 🙂 ! Now to decide whether my purse will take the cost of the muscat naturally not in the house!!
Use one of your many Aussie dessert wines…I bet Brown Bros make a muscat:)
* big smile* Anything sweet solid or liquid usually an anathema but you picked on one of my favourite names . . . next time in town 🙂 !!
Big smile back:)
I wish I liked lamb. I’ve never really developed a taste for it. Tried again two nights ago at a James Beard awarded place in New Orleans. Still no go.
I don’t eat red meat that often, in fact, very rarely. I also enjoy the lamb that I cook myself more than any that I have eaten in restaurants….so often a disappointment and sometimes quite unpleasant. I tend to use simple New Zealand legs of lamb which are hard to better.
A gorgeous leg indeed. The Jesuits may be spinning, but I like your interpretation. 😉
And boy, could they spin:)
Reblogged this on Sarah's Attic Of Treasures and Our Neck Of The Woods and commented:
Very interesting. The lamb looks to die for.
It’s been very good in sandwiches over the last few days, too 🙂
As the Jesuit saying goes, “Give me the child for his first seven years, and I’ll give you the man’. Either they got you too late,or like me, indoctrinated with the same nonsense by their female counterparts, Ignatian Nuns, you threw it all out as soon as you could, and haven’t stopped saying ‘Fuck’ ever since. They are, however, noted for hospitality, when not doing nasty things to young minds or bodies, and good wine drinking traditions emanate from this branch of Catholicism.
The leg looks handsome and I can imagine that the simple side dishes would do it justice too,
So right about the Jesuits. I remember being told that if you want to find a Jesuit, look in the Royal Box at Opera House or under the awning of a big yacht….their vow of poverty clearly permitted the enjoyment of the wealth of others:)
Ha. I just made slow roasted lamb shoulder with white beans and tomato last night. I fricking love lamb and beans 😜
Hey, that’s wonderful. Glad it worked out so well…you’re an excellent test pilot:)
I’m partial to legs… And shoulders. This looks fantastic, Roger!
Shoulder is great….but a nightmare to carve….there is,of course, the option of boned shoulder:)
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