Shari Lewis

 This is the meal that has no end...well, it did end, sadly, but that's why we have leftovers!

Tonight, I cooked up some lamb shoulder chops with pasta salad and an assortment of veggies. I'll talk about the lamb first, then the veggies, then the pasta salad.

First off, I heated my pan, then added in some butter and olive oil. Once that got good and melted/hot, I dumped in a few crushed garlic cloves and some mint leaves. I love mint with lamb.

I seasoned the lamb with salt and pepper, then started them up cooking. It took a while. Once the bottom was browned, I flipped them and kept on cooking. Eventually, I turned them onto the fat sides for a little while, then on the bone side for a little while, and, eventually, it was done. It took for-fucking-ever because I kept the heat on a medium-low, but I just kept basting it and, eventually, ended up with it cooked medium, which suited me fine.

My veggie blend tonight consisted of asparagus, carrot, mushroom, yellow onion, and garlic. I sliced the carrot, mushrooms, and garlic thinly, halved the asparagus longways, and diced the onion.

Once the lamb came out of the pan, I immediately dumped in the onion and garlic and let them start turning transparent and browning, respectively. When they were looking tasty, I dropped in the asparagus halves (interiors down) and just let them sit in the butter/oil mixture until the white interior started turning brown, at which point I dumped in the carrot, flipped the asparagus, and seasoned generously with black pepper. Once the carrot start turning transparent, I added in the mushrooms and sautéed the mushrooms, at which point the veggies were done.

The pasta salad was the real win of the night, so I saved it for last. First, I cooked my rotini, of course. I also diced up a couple of Campari tomatoes and some orange bell pepper when I was doing my veggie prep. When I dumped the noodles into my colander to drain, I put the pot back on the burner (turned to low), added a tablespoon of butter, and, when it melted, I dumped in the tomato and bell pepper and sauteed them with a pinch or two of salt. I killed the heat, dumped the pasta back in, tossed it all together with some extra virgin olive oil and a couple teaspoons of balsamic vinegar, and let it sit while I cooked the veggies.

Once the veggies were finished (see above), I cleaned out all the bits from the pan, but left the seasoned fat (oil, butter, rendered lamb fat, etc.) in there, and dumped in a handful of spinach leaves. I let them wilt down, then dumped the spinach, fat, and a good handful of shredded parmesan into the pasta pot and gave it all a good stir.

Finally, the plating was very simple tonight. I put down a bed of pasta salad, stuck a lamb chop on top, then dumped some veggies on the side because I was hungry. I did drop a few verdolagas/purslane leaves around the plate to look a little fancier, but yeah, this was a low effort presentation, but the flavor and aroma more than made up for it.