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Breast of Lamb Stuffed and Roasted
Peel off the outer skin from a breast of lamb, remove bones, stuff, (see Page 36), shape in a compact roll and sew. Spread with salt pork fat, sprinkle with salt, pepper and dredge with flour. Sear the surface over quickly in hot salt pork fat, then place in the Let cook one hour and a half, basting often with fat in pan. Serve with French Fried Sweet Potatoes and Currant Jelly Sauce. Garnish meat with sprays of fresh mint. oven.
A boned, rolled breast of lamb is one of the cheaper cuts handled like a small roast. The original text is garbled at the point where the oven appears — the stray word "oven." at the end belongs to the sentence "then place in the [hot] oven."
- The hinge: render the fatBreast of lamb is the belly, layered with fat between thin sheets of meat. A rolled breast wants an initial sear and then a long, steady roast so that fat renders out and the connective tissue softens; rushed at high heat it is greasy and chewy.
- Oven temperatureThe recipe names no temperature; the surviving text says only 'place in the ... oven.' Sear in the pan as directed, then roast at a moderate 325-350F for the stated hour and a half. If the surface browns too fast, cover loosely with foil for the middle of the cooking.
- Boning and rollingAsk a butcher to remove the rib bones and cartilage, or work a thin knife along the ribs yourself. "Sew" means closing the roll with a trussing needle and cotton thread; butcher's twine tied at 1-inch intervals does the same job and comes off more easily.
- The stuffing on Page 36The cross-referenced stuffing is not reproduced here; stuffings used this way in the period were generally bread-crumb based, moistened with melted fat or butter and seasoned. Keep it loose and use no more than will fill the roll without straining the seam; packed stuffing swells and splits the meat.
- Salt pork fatSalt pork was a common everyday cooking fat in American kitchens of the period. A thin sheet of salt pork or bacon laid over the roast, or simply brushing with oil or melted butter, gives the same protection and basting fat.
- Dredge with flourThis means a light dusting all over, not a coating. It helps the surface brown and thickens the pan drippings for the gravy.
- Basting and restingBaste every 20 minutes with the fat in the pan, then rest the roll 10–15 minutes before slicing so the stuffing sets and the slices hold together.
- YieldA boned breast weighs roughly 1 1/2 to 2 lb after trimming and serves three, perhaps four with the sweet potatoes and sauce.
- Currant jelly sauceSauces of this name in the period were generally red currant jelly melted down with a little pan juice or stock. It is a sweet-sharp counterweight to a fatty cut, which is the point of it.
Breast of lamb belongs to the frugal end of the butcher's counter, and its appearance in a book of this kind reflects how a Sunday roast could be produced from a cut that cost very little: the shape and ceremony of a roast from cheap meat. Boning, stuffing and rolling a flat, bony, fatty piece was a common economy of the period, and the same treatment was given to breast of veal and to flank. The accompaniments are period-typical too: salt pork as an everyday cooking fat, currant jelly with lamb in the English manner, and mint as a garnish rather than a sauce. Sweet potatoes were a root vegetable that stored well through winter.