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Nathan
Outlaw
28-year-old Nathan Outlaw lives in Cornwall with his
wife and two young children. He was drawn to the kitchen
from an early age - helping his father in his restaurant,
working in a local pub – and has worked for Eric
Chavot, Gary Rhodes, Rick Stein, Paul Ripley and John
Campbell. His own restaurant, the Black Pig, was awarded
a Michelin star within eight months of opening. Now
head chef at St Ervan Manor, he again won a Michelin
star in January 2006. |
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Lamb at Easter? by Nathan Outlaw
Spring lamb is associated, along with fluffy chicks
and bunny rabbits, with Easter, but it’s not always what it
seems. One of Britain’s leading young chefs, Nathan Outlaw,
of St Ervan Manor in Cornwall, explains why lambs bred especially
for Easter may not have a spring in their step.
When I think back to my childhood one thing that sticks in my mind about spring is the innocent, bouncy, newborn lambs in the fields around our home in Kent. Back then, obviously, I wouldn’t have even thought about cooking and eating them, but about four years ago, when asked to attend a lunch celebrating spring produce, we ate spring lamb. At the time I wasn’t a follower of seasons, but when I was offered a plate of dull looking, tasteless and tough meat I was shocked. This wasn’t a poor restaurant serving it either it was a top one. So I went away stunned and slightly angry. The next day I was still disturbed by the lamb’s poor quality, so I asked my local butcher what he thought. Now my butcher’s a straight talker, and as soon as I told him what had happened he laughed. Taken aback, I asked what was funny.
‘You chefs think you know everything about food, but you don’t,’
he said, explaining that the demand for spring lamb at Easter
encourages and financially forces farmers to rear their lambs
intensively.
 Basically, this means lambing earlier, around late December-early January,
and keeping them indoors because of the cold temperatures
and the shortage of lush green grass. So the lambs never actually
get to bounce around in a field or eat spring grass, instead
they are pellet fed in pens. He did say it was possible to
get good lamb at Easter though, from the West Country where
the lambing season starts earlier, but it’s very expensive
and can be hard to get hold of.
My butcher then brought over a piece of meat that looked amazing. “Look at this hogget.”
“What!”
“This is the dog’s bollocks,” he said. “A lamb that is over one year old, but not older than three, you should give it a go.”
I left the butcher’s shop with some hogget to experiment with. I must say that, personally, it beats the flavour of spring lamb by miles. Now, if I were to try and compare hogget to lamb, I would say hogget is to lamb as beef is to veal. It doesn’t need marinating, or braising, and well hung for at least two weeks and cooked pink it is amazing.
So, this Easter, unless you can guarantee that your lamb is in top condition - no bloodspots or wet-looking flesh, which are prime examples of immaturity, under-hanging and intensive farming give your local butcher a shout and ask for some hogget instead.
I have chosen two of my lamb/hogget recipes. The
first one is straightforward and safe, and the
second is a little bit more adventurous.
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