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Appetizing Lamb Chops
Neatly trim and flatten six small French lamb chops, season with a half teaspoon salt and three saltspoons pepper. Heat a tablespoon melted butter in a frying pan, arrange six thin slices lean bacon one beside another in the pan and briskly fry for two minutes on each side. Remove, keep on a plate, then place chops in same pan and fry for three minutes on each side. Dress on a dish crown-like, one overlapping another, place bacon on top of chops, fill the centre with green peas and serve very hot.
A quick pan dish with almost nothing to it, so the details matter: chop thickness, pan heat, and not crowding.
- SaltspoonsA saltspoon is a quarter teaspoon, so three of them is a generous 3/4 teaspoon of pepper for six small chops. Halve it if your pepper is freshly ground and pungent.
- "French" lamb chopsThese are rib chops with the bone scraped clean of meat and fat. Ask a butcher to french a rack, or buy a frenched rack and cut between the bones yourself.
- FlatteningGive each chop a light press with the flat of a cleaver or a heavy pan to an even 1/2 to 3/4 inch. Even thickness is the whole reason three minutes a side works here.
- TimingThree minutes per side over fairly brisk heat suits a 1/2-inch chop and leaves it pink. Anything approaching an inch thick needs five to six minutes a side, or it will be raw at the bone; 130-135F internal is medium-rare.
- The bacon fat is the pointThe chops go into the same pan straight after the bacon, so they fry in butter plus rendered bacon fat. Do not wipe the pan, but pour off any excess if the bacon was very fatty, or the chops will steam rather than brown.
- Pan sizeSix chops and six bacon slices need a 12-inch skillet, or work in two batches. Crowded chops release liquid and grey over instead of colouring.
- Green peasWritten for cooked peas, buttered and seasoned, heaped in the centre of the ring. Frozen peas dropped into boiling salted water for two minutes and tossed with butter are closer to the intent than anything from a tin.
- YieldSix chops serves two as a main course or three lightly. Have the platter warm; the chops shed heat fast.
The plating instruction is the tell: this is restaurant-style service written down for the household, chops arranged in a ring around a mound of peas. "French" chops refers to the trimming technique rather than a national recipe — frenching the bone gives the diner a clean handle and the cook a neat arrangement. Lamb with bacon and peas belongs to a long English and French spring pairing, peas being a traditional accompaniment to young lamb; the short, brisk formula reads as notes for a trained cook rather than modern step-by-step instruction.