Roast saddle of lamb with wild garlic sauce

Serves 4-6

(Laura Hynd)

A whole lamb saddle is probably the most expensive cut on the lamb but it does make an impressive whole joint to carve at the table. A whole saddle traditionally comes with the rump, which makes carving a little trickier, but as lamb rumps are a popular item these days, with lots of restaurants having them on their menus, your butcher may well cut the rump off for you.

You can either roast and serve your saddle on the bone, or as I've done here, get your butcher to bone and roll it and pop the kidneys back inside when he ties it up. This way it's really simple to carve and you won't need to go on a carving course beforehand.

1 saddle of lamb weighing about 1.5kg
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
A little vegetable or corn oil for brushing
1 whole garlic bulb, roughly chopped
A handful of rosemary

For the wild garlic sauce

A handful of wild garlic leaves, washed and dried
150-200ml rapeseed oil
2tsp Tewksbury or Dijon mustard
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Put all the sauce ingredients in a liquidiser and blend to a spooning-consistency purée, adding more rapeseed oil if necessary; season. This will keep in an air-tight container for a couple of months.

Preheat the oven to 200C/gas mark 6. Criss-cross the fat of the lamb with a knife. Place a roasting tray in the oven for 10 minutes, season the saddle with salt and pepper and place in the roasting tray. Cook for 30 minutes, then turn it over, scatter over the garlic and rosemary; cook for 30 minutes more, keeping it nice and pink. Leave to rest for 10-12 minutes, then carve into 1cm-thick slices. Serve the wild garlic sauce separately.