Easter Lamb

Happy Easter to one and all… We had a pretty quite Easter weekend. One was down with tonsillitis and the other was just shattered with a lack of sleep and a touch of the cold. Thankfully yours truly felt fine…

To celebrate Easter I paid homage to our old neighbours, the Greek family Petrakis! Lamb was on the menu and don’t I wish I was able to make this when we were kids.

I gently smoked two racks of lamb with a touch of cherry wood. Of course I marinaded the lamb for 30 hours in a mixture of extra virgin olive oil, one full head of garlic (minced), 5 springs of rosemary, 10 sprigs of thyme and 10 sprigs of fresh oregano. Chop it all up and place the lamb and the herbs into a zip top bag overnight.

When ready, get your grill set to 225F (107C) with indirect heat.  Add your cherry wood and smoke the lamb for about 45 minutes or until the internal temperature hits 120 F. Then get your grill nice and hot and sear the lamb for another 5-10 degrees more.

Rest it for 5 minutes and serve.

Another amazing, though quiet Easter for our family this year. It was rather special as I let Kalyna (the 5 year old) draw on the Imperial Kamado, turning it into a wonderful painted Easter Egg. Nice one kiddo!

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The Magic of Wagyu

Hiya grillers! Looking back at some of my photos recently  I came across a series of dinners where we devoured some amazing Australian Wagyu beef. The marbling rating was 6/7 and the cost was SGD $100/kg. QB occasionally gets Wagyu that in and it’s worth snapping up, if you’ve some extra cash on hand.

Now, the cost  may seem ridiculously expensive but it was at least $45 to $60 cheaper per kilogram than any other supplier I could find. Ergo, DEAL!

I had the butcher cut the beef into three mammoth steaks. They were about 2.5 – 3 inches thick. He then vacuum sealed them individually so that we could (yikes) freeze two out of the three steaks.

Prepping the first of the behemoths was simple as dry brining with a healthy coating of Kosher salt, that’s it! I brined them overnight so that the salt gets sucked into the beef penetrating as deeply as possible.

To grill, I used the reverse searing method, setting up the Big Green Egg for indirect heat, stabilised at 225F (107C) with a handful of Beech wood chips. Allowing for a bit of smoke, gently bring up the temperature of the steak to 115F (46C) then remove it from the grill.

Slather the steak with some pre-melted beef or lamb fat at the same time as bringing up your grill to scorching hot, direct heat. To minimise flame burn, I use Grill Grates for any searing, flipping them over to use them as a griddle top. The aircraft grade aluminium gets so hot that searing steaks is simple and quick. If you don’t own a set of theses, I highly recommend you get a set!

You want to remove the steak once the internal temperature hits 123F (50.5C). Set it aside and let it rest for 5-10 minutes. It’ll rise another few degrees but you don’t want to bring the temperature more than 130F (54C). Slice on a 45 degree angle, nice and thin. Plate it on a platter and serve.

With the fat content of these steaks, chewing was optional. Seriously, every single bite melted in your mouth with minimal effort. The taste was exceptional and honestly, I’ve not had it’s equal, not at home or in a restaurant!

Super huge thanks to my dear colleagues Jeremy and Vicky for bringing along their “significant bests” to sample this beef with us. Yes, we had two sets of guests two weeks apart from each other. Despite freezing the other two steaks, they thawed perfectly in the fridge and the taste was just as good as the chilled beef.

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Overall Heather Rating: 10/10