I don't have much evidence of it, as yet, by the weather or even the plants on the ground, but it's worth remembering that those of us who live at some altitude often see the seasons a few weeks later.
Our farm shops are, however, filling up with spring seasonal produce ... and what better to celebrate the start of a new growing year with some lamb and green vegetables?
To the kitchen! Via the farm shop!
Back home ...
Buy a rack of lamb and chop through each rib in turn to make the cutlets. Cutlets have a small pack of meat, but what a fantastic little piece of meat!
Also buy some seasonal green things - peas, green beans, stringless beans, leeks, baby courgette and mint. I also grabbed some lamb's lettuce (which sounded about right to go with lamb) and some Gevrik, which is a Cornish goat cheese. Goat cheese is flavour of the month in March, for some reason.
The final thing a dish like this needs is a jus.
Balsamic vinegar works really well with lamb and to be absolutely frank, I couldn't care less whether it is paleo or not. It's fermented, it's vinegar; that has both positive and negative connotations in the paleosphere ... I don't care. That's not sticking my fingers in my ears and shouting, "lalalalalala" when good paleo advice is being spoken, that's me just saying that some things might be beyond paleo.
The jus - take some good balsamic vinegar. You'll know it's good by how much you paid for it ... I paid almost £15 for 500ml bottle, making it about as expensive as whisky! I eat it so rarely, and when I do, it's drops, but this is a celebration - I used about 60ml of balsamic.
In a pan, reduce ... when sticky, whisk in some good butter. I used proper Yorkshire butter from "cows which live outside and eat grass". You do this bit last, but I got carried away ...
Steam the green beans, stringless beans and peas.
Bring a griddle pan to a good heat and cook the cutlets a mere minute, or two, on each side. Set aside to rest. Place the babe courgettes on the griddle sliced on the angle.
The remainder comes together quickly ...
In a frying pan, warm a little olive oil, adding in some leek shredded across the angle, the pre-steamed green things, tossing in the courgettes once they've had a minute, or so, to char on the griddle.
On a clean white plate, pour out the jus in a circle. Place a mound of green vegetables in the middle, sprinkle some chopped mint over and lay the cutlets against the mound.
Garnish with lamb's lettuce and slices of Gevrik.
