Stuffed and rolled lamb with spinach and gremolata

This was a bit of an experiment attempting to get that slow roasted lamb tenderness in much less time.I mixed a Greek slow roasted lamb recipe I know with a stuffed lamb and because I didn’t have white wine I used champagne instead, I think it turned out blooming marvellously! I tend to use whatever boneless piece of meat I  can get reduced in the and have thrown in the freezer, this one is a shoulder.

Gremolata is a mixture parsley, lemon zest and garlic. The lamb I used weighed 700g and I fed three people with it, though it could have easily fed four.

Ingredients

Small bunch parsley (about 15 sprigs)

2/3 cloves garlic

Zest of ¾ lemon

Boneless joint of lamb

130 g (half a bag) of spinach

White onion

Lemon

100ml chicken stock

½ glass champagne

Finely chop parsley and garlic (I find a mini chopper a lifesaver here!) and mix with lemon zest. Tada! You’ve made gremolata!

Preheat the oven to 180 (I have a fan oven, adjust accordingly)

Dice the onion and soften in a pan on medium heat. Keep stirring! You do not want the onion to brown and the slower it cooks the sweeter the flavour. Once its nearing translucency remove from pan.

Put the spinach in this pan and wilt, then squeeze in a colander or sieve to get rid of as much moisture as possible.

Chop up spinach and mix with the gremolata and onion (if my mini chopper is otherwise occupied I’ll use a pair of scissors in a smallish bowl to chop the herbs spinach and mix it all up).

Unroll lamb and spread a thin layer of the mix over it

Roll back up and secure with string of pre-soaked bamboo or wooden skewers (this stops them burning in the oven, use this technique for the barbecue too.)

Slice half a lemon into wedges and place in the baking tray with 100ml hot stock and half a glass of champagne (or white wine). Put in the oven for 15 minutes, then turn oven down to 140 and cover lamb with foil (baking paper will also work here, you just need to tuck it properly around). Cook for a further 40 minutes (adjust according to weight and as you can see from the picture, I like my lamb pink, for more well done I'd add up to 20 more minutes here) before turning the oven up for the last 10 minutes of cooking to 180. 

Allow lamb to rest (under foil/baking paper and lots of tea towels) for at least 10 minutes before carving. It will keep the heat and it makes such a difference to the amount of juice the meat retains.