Inspired by a recipe for Wine-Braised Lamb Shanks on Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives (prepared at Giusti’s Place), I created this recipe for lamb shanks. A little bit of spice and acid go a long way in my version. Their idea to serve the lamb with sauced, wet polenta inspired me to serve with a grilled polenta cake.
This meal is great for dinner parties, as it can all be done ahead of time. The polenta can be done a day or two ahead of time, and the lamb just sits in the oven until you’re ready to serve.
Enjoy!
Lamb Pizzaiola
~makes 4 entrees
Ingredients
- 4 Lamb Shanks (about 3 pounds)
- All Purpose Flour (enough to coat shanks, about 1/4 cup)
- 3 tbsp. Vegetable Oil
- 2 tbsp. Unsalted Butter
- 3/4 cup diced Carrots
- 3/4 cup diced Onion
- 1/2 cup diced Celery
- 1 tsp. Fennel Seed, ground
- 1/2 tsp. Red Pepper Flakes
- 2 tbsp. Tomato Paste
- 2 tbsp. Granulated Garlic
- 1/2 cup + 1 cup Red Wine
- 3 oz. (6 tbsp.) Lemon Juice (the juice from three lemons)
- 2 tbsp. Dried Oregano
- 1 (28 oz.) can Tomato Sauce (with basil)
- Kosher Salt
- Black Pepper
- Grated Parmigiano-Reggiano Cheese to garnish
Instructions
1. Brine shanks over night (at least 12 hours).
2. Pre-heat oven to 350 deg F oven. Season shanks, dredge in flour, brown in oil and butter in a large saute pan.
3. Remove browned lamb to 9″ x 13″ pan. Add lemon juice and 1 cup of wine.
4. With oil remaining in saute pan, saute carrots, celery, and onion. Season with ground fennel seed, salt, and black pepper. After about 10 minutes, caramelize tomato paste. Stir in garlic. When well combined, deglaze with 1/2 cup of wine. Pour contents of pan over shanks.
5. Season shanks with half of oregano; cover with tomato sauce; then remaining oregano. Cover pan with tented aluminum foil, make a one inch slit to vent steam, cook in oven for three hours.
6. Serve with polenta. Garnish with Parmigiano-Reggiano.
I followed Epicurious’ Grilled Polenta recipe, with a few modifications. First, I substituted half the onion with red onion (rather than yellow), this gave awesome color. Second, I stirred 1/4 cup of the Parmesan into the polenta before cooling. And, third, I set mine in a 9″x9″ baking dish, because we don’t own an 11″x7″ and it’s close enough in size for my taste.
Lots more pictures in the Flickr set.
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Looks like a wonderful dish!
I am Swiss so I am big time polenta fan! Yummmo!
I love lamb shanks!! But I found them a lot of work!! Yours look so delicious!! Wow!
Who can deny the great combination of polenta with a hearty, flavorful meat? It just takes on so many levels of flavor.
looks so yum!
Sophie – You should try this recipe, other than a bunch of chopping, it’s really easy. Basically: brown in pan, braise in oven, serve. 🙂
That’s really cool! We don’t get much lamb down here.
What is the brine recipe?
Jane – There are many brine recipes out there, and any of them would be fine here. The most basic brine is simply salt-saturated water. The typical formula is about 1 cup of salt to 1 gallon of water. The second-most basic brine adds equal parts salt and sugar to the water. Honestly, at this point, I don’t remember which of these I did, but I suspect I likely did sugar and salt. More flavorful brines may include aromatics such as herbs, spices, or aromatic veggies (carrots, celery, onions, etc.).
You want to brine foods based on how dense the meat is. So items like lamb need a long time, like 12 hours, whereas seafood usually only needs an hour.
Wow, amazing. I didn’t even know this was a dish. I cooked up a similar dish the other day and have fallen in love with it. I like to fry my polenta in olive oil and to slowly cook (after browning it) the lamb in tomato sauce. I was so amazed by the deep flavor the lamb gave the tomato sauce. Perfect on top of polenta. Glad I’m not just a weirdo!
Fran, what a great dish for winter huh? Of course you’re not a wierdo….a wierdo for loving good food? haha.