Lamb is a traditional dish of the Easter meal, whether it is cooked on Sunday or Monday.

Europe 1 goes back to the origins of this tradition and gives you a recipe to cook it in the best possible way, this weekend or any other time of the year.

For the second year in a row, the Easter holiday is very strongly disrupted due to the coronavirus crisis.

But, as in every spring, the tradition inevitably returns, after the inevitable egg hunt: that of eating, with family or friends, a lamb on the occasion of this festival.

A habit in many French homes for Easter, whether they are believers or atheists, as well as a ritual with religious origins.

Why don't we eat another animal at Easter?

The explanation comes from the Bible, where the word "lamb" comes up repeatedly.

It actually symbolizes Jesus, "the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world".

Eating lamb at Easter is therefore a tribute to Jesus.

It is not only Christians who eat a lamb at Easter: the Jews, for whom this feast is the symbol of the end of slavery, are in the habit of sacrificing this animal on this occasion.

Suckling lamb or sheepfold?

From a more down-to-earth point of view, lamb is a seasonal meat in spring, just as vegetables have their season.

We will find it under different categories at the butcher.

The suckling lamb thus drinks only its mother's milk.

Very young, he was shot after forty days.

He was not weaned.

Its meat is white, thin and delicate, but it is very expensive.

It is arguably the best lamb.

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The sheepfold lamb, meanwhile, has already been weaned.

The meat is already more marked and more colorful, but it's still a lamb.

We are entitled to the name lamb until the tenth month of the beast, after it becomes a sheep.

The salted meadows lamb covers a protected designation of origin in the bay of Mont Saint-Michel.

It is a lamb that eats what it finds around its growing region, meadows covered by the sea. Special vegetation will grow there, which gives the lamb a taste.

You can eat lamb in chops, to grill.

With a brush, we spread a little fat, such as olive oil, a little thyme, salt and pepper.

On a hot pan, sear the chops for 30 seconds on each side.

The pan is removed from the heat and left to stand for three to four minutes, the time for the heat to diffuse.

We can also and especially eat it in leg, which will interest us here, with a perfect recipe for cooking it.

The seven o'clock leg of lamb

The ingredients for six people:

- 1 large shoulder of lamb of 2.5 kg


- 150 gr of rind


- 2 onions


- 10 cl of olive oil


- 30 cl of white wine


- 120 gr of carrots


- 20 cl of beef broth


- 1 bunch garnished


- 300 g of peeled tomatoes


- Salt


- Pepper

The steps of the recipe:

1.

Salt and pepper the leg of the lamb.

2.

At the bottom of a casserole dish, put some rind, with the fat on the outside.

3.

Place the leg together with the carrots, onions and tomatoes.

Salt and pepper again.

4.

Pour in olive oil, white wine, add thyme.

Mix everything to obtain a homogeneous marinade.

5.

Bake for 7 hours in the oven at 120 degrees.

6.

Add more water if necessary.

7.

Serve with a spoon, because the leg of lamb is so tender that it can be cut with a spoon.