As we mentioned earlier, we’ll be making an effort to teach you how cook more unusual cuts of meat. That’s because we’ve committed to only buying pastured, humane meat from now on. And that’s not cheap.
Guess what? Unusual cuts are much more affordable!
Today, we’ll share how we made braised lamb necks and turned them into an amazing nutrient dense stew full of healthy, healing grass-fed gelatin!
Remember, cooking these things may be foreign to you, but meat is meat and once it’s cooked, I defy you to tell the difference. After all, what is a neck but the head end of the spine? If you enjoy ribs or oxtail, you can eat a neck!
I tried to do this in a very traditional way by coating it in spiced “flour”, browning it, then braising it in juice and stock for many hours. I hope you enjoy it, because we did!
Picking apart the incredibly tender meat from the bones, after the stew was finished, was like going on a paleontologist adventure! We found amazingly thick and nutrient-dense bone marrow (which easily pushed right out) and the boys liked putting the bones back together like a puzzle after!
Braised Lamb Neck
Ingredients
2 C coconut flour
2 Tbsp paprika
1 Tbsp salt
1 tsp pepper
2 lamb necks, whole (about 2.5lbs)
2 Tbsp lard
1 Large Onion, sliced
3 cloves garlic, crushed
8 medium carrots, peeled and cut into 2 inch sections
1 C white wine or apple juice
4 C chicken stock
2 tsp salt
2 bay leaf
1 tsp dried rosemary
1 tsp dried thyme
1 tsp pepper
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 275 degrees
- ♥ In a large bowl, combine flour, paprika, salt and pepper
- ♥ Coat necks in the flour-spice mixture
- In large Dutch oven, melt lard over medium-high heat
- Brown necks on all sides, about 4 minutes per side
- Remove necks from pot (set-aside) and add onions, garlic and carrots (add additional fat if needed)
- Saute aromatics for about 8 minutes until onions are soft
- Add wine or juice and stock, return necks to pot
- Increase heat and bring to a boil
- Add remaining ingredients and stir
- Cover and place in oven for 4 hours or until meat is falling off bones
- Once cooked, gently remove bones and add back meat and marrow to stew (meat will fall off when cooked)
- Serve over cauliflower puree or cauli-rice
♥ Symbol indicates steps you can do with your child! If old enough, let them stir and add things to the pot, too!
Don’t be afraid – it’s AMAZING! Even the kids couldn’t get enough.
Hope this inspires you to dethaw those necks you bought ages ago and attempt to cook them up!
