One of my close friends and regular taste tester for my cooking adventures had his greek Mum staying over in the UK.
I offered to cook and then got down to the decision of what to cook. This was the perfect opportunity to have a crack at one of those dishes on my 'must cook someday' list, Kleftico. A classic Greek lamb dish.

Having served it there was an eyebrow raised about the colour but compliments on the smell. This had me worried until I mentioned that it was cooked with lemon. 'Oh it's a white Kelftico, then that's all good, I thought you were making a red one'. So with some relief we cracked on and I can say that it passed the 'Mum' test. However, I have now added red Kleftico to the must cook list.
Cooked with lemon, it's a white, cooked with tomatoes its a red.

This version is a very rich, garlic heavy, simple one pot dish which you can put together 6 hours before it's needed and served with some simple sides or just some nice bread. Or both! It was adapted from one of my favourite books, stewed, a great addition to any cookbook library.

Step 1 - Prep the lamb

• Pre-heat your oven to 150C
• Trim as much fat as you can off the lamb, reserving some
• Heat a heavy lidded pot
• Melt some of the fat with some olive oil
• Brown off the lamb in batches then set aside
• Whilst the lamb is browning, peel and half the cloves from 2 bulbs of garlic.
  Give each clove a bash with the flat of your knife for some quick peel action
• Once each piece of lamb has cooled enough to handle, cut many holes and stuff with the garlic 

Step 2 - The veg

• Slice your waxy potatoes, cut the larger ones into quarters and smaller ones in half
• Peel the onions then slice in half and quarters
• Put all the veg in a large bowl

Step 3 - The marinade

• In another bowl, grate the zest from the lemons
• Half and squeeze the juice into the bowl, catching any pips
• Pour in the extra virgin olive oil
• Add the dried oregano
• About 15-20 twists of the pepper mill
• Finally, add three good pinches of sea salt
• Mix it all up

Step 4 - Bring it all together

• Wipe the dish used to brown the lamb with some kitchen paper
• Rub the lamb all over with the marinade and put into the pot
• Add the remainder of the rub to the potatoes and onions and mix up ensuring everything is well covered
• Put the covered onions and spuds into the pot with the lamb
• Any garlic left over from step 1 throw this in the pot as well, giving it one final mix
• Cover with some parchment, pressing down and tucking it in at the sides
• Add two layers of tin foil to the top, put the lid on and tucking it tight to make a seal
• Once done, put it in the oven for 5 hours but here's the hardest part, don't be tempted to look, just leave it

Step 5 - Finale

• After its ready, pull off the tin foil and paper
• With the lid slightly ajar, pour off the juices into a glass heat proof bowl.
  Be careful as steam will come out the other side 
• Skim off as much fat from the bowl as you can (I put the fat in a jam jar, keep in the fridge and use it for fried eggs!)
• Carefully find and remove the bones from the meat, they should pull out clean
• Add the juices back to the pot and stir which will start to break up the lamb
• Serve on a platter surrounded by some lightly toasted bread, give it a healthy covering of extra virgin olive oil and sprinkle with freshly chopped flat leaf parsley

I served this with some garlic greens, a tomato salad and some salty charred peppers.

Kleftico Lemonato

• Whole shoulder of lamb cut into 6 pieces, roughly 6kg (get your butcher to do this)
• Olive oil (for browning)
• 500g waxy small potatoes
• 4 large onions (red or white)

Marinade

• 6 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• 3 tbsp dried greek oregano
• 4 lemons
• Sea salt
• Pepper

Finish

• Flat leaf parsley 
• Extra virgin olive oil
• Some nice bread