Skillet Roasted Cauliflower

Ingredients:

1 small head of cauliflower (about 1 pound)

Coconut oil, as needed, or neutral cooking oil such as grape seed or safflower

1/2 tsp Kosher salt, more to taste

1 tsp smoked paprika

1/2 tsp ground cumin

1/2 tsp cracked black pepper

1 lemon, preferably organic

1 red onion, roughly chopped

1 tbsp chopped fresh mint or cilantro

Black Garlic Rack of Lamb

Before you do anything else, season your rack of lamb with a teaspoon of Kosher salt, rubbing the salt into the meat. The lamb will benefit if you have time to do this the night before, but it's not a deal breaker if you didn't plan ahead. (I cut my rack in half to better fit in the sous vide bag, but this is optional.)

To prep the black garlic butter, peel the bulb and use a spoon or flat spatula to mash up the sticky black cloves. For easiest clean up, do this on a sheet of wax paper or parchment. Once you've worked the cloves into a paste you can incorporate the butter. Add a small pinch of salt and a generous pinch of black pepper. You could definitely do this in a food processor, but unless you're doing a couple sticks of butter at a time it's probably not worth the extra dishes.

Keep mashing until the black garlic and butter are incorporated pretty evenly, but before the butter starts to melt too much. Scoop 4 tablespoons into a small bowl, which will be for the lamb. The rest can be rolled into a log and refrigerated or frozen for future use! 

Now, back to the lamb...

For the sous vide method, which is my preference:

Prepare a sous vide water bath, setting the temperature on your circulator to 130°F. Place the salted rack of lamb (cut in half if necessary) into a plastic freezer-safe bag or vacuum bag. Use your vacuum sealer or the water displacement method to expel excess air from the bag. When the water reaches 130°F, submerge the bag of lamb and cook for 2 hours, or up to 4 hours.

After the lamb cooks, remove it from the bag and pat dry.  Smear it all over with black garlic butter.

Heat your skillet over medium high heat, just shy of smoking. Place the rack fat cap side down into the hot skillet and sear for about 90 seconds, then flip to the other side. As the butter melts and lamb fat renders, tilt the skillet to one side and use a spoon to baste the top of the rack with all that goodness. Don't overcook it at this step; it should only be in the skillet for a couple minutes total.

Transfer the finished rack of lamb to a cutting board. Slice and serve immediately, no need to rest. Drizzle with extra butter from the skillet.

For the quick oven-roasted method (adapted from the NY Times):

Preheat your oven to 500°F. Smear the salted rack of lamb on all sides with the black garlic butter. Place the racks with the fat cap side up on top of a metal cooking rack fitted inside a heavy duty sheet pan. Stick a probe thermometer in the center of the lamb chop, where the meat is thickest. Transfer the pan to the oven and roast until the meat reaches about 120°F. Pull the lamb out and transfer it to a cutting board, leaving the probe thermometer in. Allow the meat to rest for 5 to 10 minutes before serving, during which time the meat will continue to cook. My goal was to finish at around 130-135°F for medium rare. If you prefer your lamb cooked more than that, you can let it roast longer before resting.

This method is nice if you have multiple racks to cook at once and don't want to deal with the extra step to sear them all. The downside is that you may not end up with a crusty outer surface for smaller racks. The meat can go from rare to overcooked in almost no time, so the probe thermometer is essential. Timing will vary from rack to rack. It could finish in as little as 10 minutes or up to 20 minutes for bigger racks.

For the reverse sear method:

Preheat your oven to 250°F. Smear the salted rack of lamb on all sides with half of the black garlic butter, about 2 tablespoons. Place the racks with the fat cap side up on top of a metal cooking rack fitted inside a heavy duty sheet pan. Stick a probe thermometer in the center of the lamb chop, where the meat is thickest. Transfer the pan to the oven and roast until the meat reaches about 115°F, which could take up to an hour depending on the size of the rack. Take the pan out of the oven, transfer the rack of lamb to a cutting board and allow the meat to rest for 10 minutes.

If it's not too difficult to maneuver, just leave the probe thermometer in for the next step, otherwise you might want to switch to a handheld instant read thermometer. Heat your skillet over medium high heat, just shy of smoking. Smear the rack of lamb with the remaining 2 tablespoons of butter. Place the rack fat cap side down into the hot skillet and sear for about 90 seconds, then flip to the other side. As the butter melts and lamb fat renders, tilt the skillet to one side and use a spoon to baste the top of the rack. Keep an eye on the temperature, and remove the lamb as it's approaching 130°F for medium rare. There's not much need to rest again, so by the time you transfer it back to a cutting board and slice you'll be in good shape to serve. 

Serving inspiration:

Special occasion or holiday dinner? The black garlic butter is so good on its own, you would be fine plopping a couple chops on top of mashed potatoes or a nice rice pilaf, with green veggies on the side. I'd suggest balsamic roasted asparagus (skip the truffle salt), or garlicky roasted greens. For the mashed potatoes and other veggie side options, check out my Holiday Recipe Collection.

Casual dinner, small plates or appetizers? Consider pairing the sliced lamb chops with a bright herb sauce. I love the classic pairing of mint and lamb, so I made the salsa verde recipe from my Appetizers Handbook and incorporated lots of fresh mint and lemon zest.

The texture is very similar to chimichurri sauce, which would also work with a number of herbs.

For a veggie component, I did a simple pan of roasted root veggies. They were tossed with grape seed oil and my Moroccan Rub, which is also in the Appetizers Handbook. Check the Roasted Veggie Platter recipe in that book for tips on roasting the veggies too!

A Faster Way to Southern Greens with the InstantPot

2 lbs smoked bone-in pork or turkey (such as ham hocks, neckbones, turkey wings or turkey necks)
2 yellow onions, peeled and sliced in half
4 cloves garlic
1 tbsp smoked paprika
1/2 tsp crushed red pepper flakes
8 cups water or chicken stock; more if needed
Several sprigs thyme
2 bay leaves
1 tsp peppercorns
2 tbsp apple cider vinegar, more as needed
5 lbs collard greens, destemmed and chopped (or 4 lbs if pre-chopped)
1 tbsp maple syrup (optional)
2 tbsp butter
Salt, to taste
Cracked black pepper, to taste
Hot sauce, for serving

Active Time: 1 hour
Total Time: 1 hour, 30 minutes (give or take)
Yield: Serves 8
Special Equipment: InstantPot or other electric pressure cooker, large pot

*Note: You can make as little as one pound of greens at a time using this method, if you plan to freeze the rest of the stock for another batch. I won't even judge if you dumped a bag of shredded greens in, but you could certainly work with fresh greens just like the original recipe. A mix of collards, kale, mustard greens or turnip greens also works.

To get started, place the smoked meat, peeled onion halves, garlic, smoked paprika and red pepper flakes into the InstantPot. Add enough water or stock to cover; at least six cups, but if you have room you can add more. (Like I mentioned above, you might as well make enough to freeze some for later.) Throw in the thyme, bay leaves, and peppercorns, then pour in two tablespoons of vinegar. Close the lid of the InstantPot. When closed properly, you'll hear it clamp and lock in place.



Select the option for Meat/Stew or manually set your pressure cooker for 35 minutes on high pressure. The pot will take several minutes to heat up and build pressure before the timer starts to count down, at which point you'll know it's working. After the 35 minutes are up, the timer will go off, but there will be too much pressure to open the lid. I use the "natural release" method and let the steam release on its own gradually. This takes another 15 to 20 minutes, and gives the stock even more time to build flavor. If you were really in a rush, you could push the vent open to manually release the pressure. Just be careful if you do that with a pot full of liquid, as the steam is very hot and tends to splatter.

Here's what I had after 35 minutes of pressure cooking and about 20 minutes to naturally release the steam:


I carefully ladled the stock through a mesh strainer and discarded the onions, herbs, bay leaves, and peppercorns. If you happen to find the garlic just mash it into the stock. Once I was down to the big chunks of meat, I transferred them to a pan and set aside until cool enough to handle. For this particular batch, I used 4 cups of stock for 2 pounds of greens and froze the rest of my stock (and some of the meat) for a future batch of greens. Remember that the greens will give off liquid on their own, so you can always wait to see what you end up with and add more stock if really necessary.


Pour the strained stock into a large pot and bring it up to a boil. Before you get to this step, you can always saute some fresh onions in the pot if you like that for texture, but I found that my broth was rich enough on its own in flavor. Once the stock is bubbling, add chopped greens by the handful and let them cook down until you can fill up the pot. (By the way, I don't recommend actually cooking your greens in the InstantPot using a pressure cooker setting, as they can end up with a mushy overcooked texture. But if you were making a small batch, you could certainly use the "Saute" function to heat your stock, then simmer the greens, leaving the pot lid open. It would be just like cooking them on a stove top in this case.)

While the greens are simmering, you can pull off the bits of tender meat that should be falling off the bones. Discard the bones, fat, and tough bits of skin. Shred or chop up the meat and add it to the greens as they finish cooking. If you're freezing any stock, you should add some of the meat to your containers. To this day, my favorite kind of meat to use for greens is ham hocks. It's just so unctuous and flavorful... hard to resist!


Season the cooked greens to taste with salt and pepper, and add the maple syrup if using. You may also want to wake things up with an extra splash or two of vinegar and hot sauce for heat. Let the greens cook for twenty minutes or so, until they're adequately tender and have absorbed all that good flavor. To finish, stir in the butter.


The nice thing about this method is that you can enjoy the greens while they still have more of a bite left, which is how I like them. It was a fresher flavor, almost like a really good soup. The second day, or after additional simmering, the greens take on a softer texture and more of that dark murky coloring. The pot liquor gets better and better.

So there you have it! Authentic greens in half the time. I enjoyed a bowl of reheated greens today for Sunday dinner, with cornbread of course. These days I've been using gluten-free flour, but my skillet cornbread recipe cooks up just the same!