Then aromatic vegetables are your best bet. I'd do onions, quartered, garlic, carrot and celery chopped roughly. Then spices are a judgement call--lots of choices. I'd put a spice rub outside the chicken, but some of the same spices inside too. I'm particularly fond of parsely, sage, rosemary, and thyme, and I might add some turmeric to that, or emphasise any one of those four spices above the others (especially sage or rosemary).

Thanks! I'll put them on my shopping list.

wow, this thread has gotten really long. there's some good stuff in here though I'd hate for it to go *poof*


Anyway. I occasionally think about this and then never do anything about it, but Dev's 9. Sometime soon I should prolly think about sex education. My mum was really blunt and answered any question I asked, but she consulted a really old medical book and her own experience.

My question is many-fold. Should something like this have a thread? I'm kinda asking about good books on the subject, should it go in Other Authors? Flame Wars? Hell, if I can't even figure out how to discuss it here, how will I discuss it with him?? *wibbles*

i have a piece of lamb, cooking instructions state :

quote:

cook for 3 hours at 160, cooks tip, for even better results, if you have time cook for 4-5 hours.

fine, i may have time - but would anyone like to tell me what temporature I need to put my oven at? i suspect at 160 it will burn to a crisp!

160°C is fine, just make sure it doesn't lose its juices by evaporating.

by...adding a little water after a while?

cover it with foil and baste it regularly? i've never cooked lamb, so i don't know

Lamb here is usually fatty enough that you would -maybe- have to add a little water to the pan juices for enough basting juice. If it's braised it gets some liquid to the pan while cooking.

How many pounds of meat (and what cut) is it? If it's at least 4lb. knock your oven back to 120C (if you have the whole 4-5 hours). I would brown it a bit on all sides, cover it tightly and shove it the oven. I wouldn't even bother peeking for at least a couple of hours.

If it's a shank you braise the longer and slower you go the better. The meat gets fall-off-the-bone tender.
Leg of lamb is treated more like a roast.

My own self? I cook lamb with garlic and rosemary and cracked pepper.

quote:

Leg of lamb is treated more like a roast.

Or you do a confit! Yummmmmmm (and totally offtopic)

thank you for your suggestions, i'll keep it in mind if this one works okay, but we're now 2 hours into cooking time!

it was just shoved in the oven, but it wasn't just a joint of lamb, it was a marks and spensers joint of lamb so it had some herbs on it.

eta : it was/is a shoulder of lamb.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Smaug,

heh as an old fashioned kiwi we just bung it in the oven at 180 for 2-3 hours for a shoulder, in a pan uncovered and wait as it fills the house with yummy smokey lamb smell. It will spit and sizzle and reduce down alot, with lamb it doesn't need to be "slow cooked" as such and pink in the middle is how i like it. If you ave mutton ten yea it has to be cooked down to get that melt in the mouth yummyniss you get with lamb.

Pink in the middle is the way to go! Never done a shoulder, it seems that chops, leg or shank are the most easily found here

I'm sure however you cook it, it will be lovely!

Now, should I sign for the two younger girls to have the Cervical cancer jab? (Frog opted out after reading about it - not sure if she made right or wrong choice - but it's her choice)

And, is anyone organising a partay or whatever for the blog's birthday - which Mr Neil says is on 9 February?

If I had a girl-child, she'd be in the queue for the jab. It seems like a wondrous thing!

Well, that's what I thought after getting abnormal cells aged 22 and having a biopsy and then finding out that they don't do smear tests until you are 25 now!

I has one more question.

Could any London boardies take a kidlet (15) for work experience in June? She wants something exciting but doesn't know quite what.

quote:

Originally posted by Motley:
Now, should I sign for the two younger girls to have the Cervical cancer jab?

At this point, I'm pretty sure my daughters will get the vaccination in the future.

Although I recall that Seccotine (?) made a very interesting case here against that particular vaccination campaign...? But I've already forgotten what her argument was, just that she seemed well informed... _{I'm not being very useful, am I.}

I should try and see if I can still find that thread here somewhere.

quote:

Originally posted by Motley:
Could any London boardies take a kidlet (15) for work experience in June? She wants something exciting but doesn't know quite what.

What is she interested in?

Hive - She doesn't know! Used to be drama - not now.
Um, writing, science, health, art, music. She's not into fantasy but maybe that's just her retreating from my blabbering!

She's left it too late to write, so I'm ringing around today - the places she's suggested are: Orthodontists, Hospitals, Film/Media, inc BFI, Bafta, Southbank, Animal places. You name it!

Somebody explain, the people making Invictus, are they depending on the power of Nelson Mandela, Morgan Freeman and Matt Damon to get bums on seats in the US for a rugby film, or am I massively underestimating the collective rugby knowlege of North America here?