Rose garam masala lamb recipe
First make the garam masala by grinding together in a pestle and mortar 11/2tbsp dried edible rose petals, 1 star anise, 1 small cinnamon stick, 1/2tsp cumin seeds, 6 cloves, 5 green cardamom pods and 1 long dried chilli.
Now pound to a paste an inch of peeled ginger and a garlic clove.
Peel and finely chop a red onion, and fry until golden.
Mix this with the garlic-and-ginger paste, all but 1tsp of the garam masala, 300ml yogurt, the juice of a lime and a pinch of salt.
Slather over 4 lamb chops – cutlets are fine too – and marinate overnight, if possible.
When ready to cook, scrape off most of the marinade and griddle or barbecue for 3-6 minutes on each side. Serve dusted with the remaining garam masala and scattered with fresh or dried rose petals.
THE INGREDIENT: ROSE
BY CHEF AND FOOD WRITER JO WEINBERG
Adding rose to cooking is a bit like discovering your supermodel neighbour has a master’s degree in engineering – you may be smitten forever. What is an all-delicate fragrance in a vase becomes a gentle hit of floral sweetness in a dish, lifting it in a way that most ingredients can’t begin to.
It’s tempting to assume the English have a kind of ownership over rose. Here, it has been recorded in cooking since recipes were first written – and used for hundreds of years before. Until the introduction of vanilla in the 17th century, it was our preferred flavouring, mostly in the form of rosewater, from taffety tarts (apple tarts glazed with rosewater) to chewits (pies filled with minced meat). There is a glorious 18th-century recipe for glazed ham spiced with cardamom, coriander and rose which stands the test of time. Now, rose may be more likely to give flight to a cloud of meringues, or add a heady romance to chocolate mousse or truffles. It’s worth noting that all roses are edible – it is only their treatment by spraying that renders some unsuitable for the plate.
Go east and you will stumble upon it quickly. It is widespread in sweets, from the delicate pastries of Lebanon to, of course, Turkish delight. But, like cinnamon, it is more interesting when it makes an appearance in savoury dishes. Rose is used distinctively in Moroccan cooking. It is particularly good in combination with quail and lamb, sometimes adding a hit of fragrance in the signature spice mix ras-el-hanout – used as a rub for meat and base note for many tagines. It enhances harissa, too, the
fiery but aromatic red-pepper paste that is added to almost everything in the Maghrebian cooking of the North African coastal countries.
Head further east again, and you’ll encounter rose as a regular guest in the food of India and Pakistan, in bright-pink milkshakes and ices, and very sweet rice puddings. Most delightfully, it is often the leading note in garam masala, a spice blend that is used as the base for many dishes and curries found across these two countries. There is a wild rose in Pakistan called desi gulab, whose intense depth of fragrance and deep purple-red hues make it very special to cook with.
Every household will have its own recipe, and here is mine: a beloved marinade for lamb. If you can find rose-petal jam, stir through a squeeze of lemon and a little pounded garlic to use as a jelly to accompany the meat.
THE BEST WINE TO PAIR WITH ROSE RECIPES
BY MALCOLM GLUCK
It’s not every day one cooks a dish using a wild-rose recipe from Pakistan. An utterly surprising recipe, therefore, requires a totally surprising wine. And I believe I have found the perfect bottle. It cannot come from Pakistan as it doesn’t produce wine, so we must look elsewhere: Australia. Why? Because the sweet floral uplift of those rose-marinated lamb chops requires a sunny wine, rich enough to handle the spice but not so hearty it overwhelms it.
But before we get to this, the chef needs to have vinous refreshment to hand as they cook. And in this regard Australia is also my chosen vineland. There is a choice of two sublime liquids, both Chardonnays, both beautifully textured and svelte, and both putting to shame many a highly regarded white Burgundy costing a great deal more. This awesome twosome are Leeuwin Estate Art Series Chardonnay 2012 (£61.95 a bottle at Slurp) and, by the case at Berry Bros & Rudd, Penfolds Yattarna Chardonnay 2011 (£526.80). These are not just two of the greatest Chards in Oz, but two of the greatest on the planet. A glass (or two) of these silkily delicious wines is the ideal thought-provoking treat as you slave over a stove.
Which brings us to what to drink with this dish. It has to be red, and for this I choose Australia too. And when Oz is mentioned alongside red wine, do you not think immediately of the Shiraz grape? You do. But have you ever tried it in its sparkling manifestation? Peter Lehmann Masters Black Queen Sparkling Shiraz 2012 is a wonderful treat from nose to throat. Unlike our two whites, which model themselves on the wines of Europe, Sparkling Shiraz is unique to Australia. It exists nowhere else except, to purchase, at Highbury Vintners (£24), Eton Vintners (£22.95), Noble Green (£22), and ozwines.co.uk (£21.99). The texture is like embroidered taffeta, the fruit is redolent of smoked plums with liquorice and black olive, and the finish, boosted by all that effervescence, is mysteriously exciting, sensually arousing and utterly sublimely scrumptious.
I know. It sounds bizarre, a sparkling red (there is a red Champagne curiously, Bouzy Rouge, but it’s not much appreciated in Britain), but the fact is that with its Sparkling Shiraz, Australia has created a wine which only it could create. It is, to my mind, the essence of the country in a bottle: streamlined, modern, confident (but not brash), and with those lamb chops it’s as perfect a marriage as can be arranged.
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