Easter Roast Dinner in a pizza oven

Apart from pizza (of course!), Sunday roast has got to be our favourite food. Not least because you can cook it in a pizza oven! With the long Easter weekend almost upon us, we’re sur. Perhaps planning on whacking a leg of lamb in the oven to make the centrepiece of your Easter Roast Dinner. But stop, hang on a minute, before you go preheating the fan assist, have you considered cooking it in your Igneus Pizza Oven?! If not, read on…

Why Pizza Ovens are Great for Meat

We won’t go into too much detail here, because we’ve already written an whole article on the subject which covers The Best Meats to Cook in your Pizza Oven. But essentially, the main reason wood fired pizza ovens are so good for cooking meat is the flavour that’s imparted from the flames and the wood itself. The flame licked meat is subtlety smoky, and so rich in flavour, but at the same time because of the high cooking temperatures, if you’re cooking meat such as lamb or beef, you can keep the meat pink and deliciously moist.

Roast Leg of Lamb

We’ve chosen to focus on lamb just because it’s so synonymous with Easter. However, you can cook pretty much any joint of meat in your Igneus Pizza Oven, so just go with your favourite. For our recipe you’ll need to following ingredients to serve around 4-6 people.

• 2 kg leg of lamb
• 4-5 cloves of garlic
• Rosemary – 2-3 sprigs
• 2 brown onions
• 60ml extra virgin olive oil
• Tsp sea salt & Tsp black pepper

You’ll see from the above that there’s very few ingredients, which obviously great because as we know, the best tasting food is often the easiest to prepare, and this recipe is no exception. To make it you’ll need your pizza oven up to a temperature of around 210°C. If you’re using an Igneus Bambino or Classico, or an oven from our Pro range, the in-built temperature gauge comes in very handy. If you’re using the Igneus Minimo, we recommend using an Infrared Digital Thermometer.

Slice the garlic in half lengthways, and then cut slits into the leg of lamb and press the garlic into the slits. Next, press the rosemary into the cuts along with the garlic. This imparts so much flavour deep into the meat as it cooks. A good tip here is to make sure you press the garlic and the rosemary deep into the meat and don’t leave it poking up as it has a tendency to burn.

Next, slice the onions into 1cm circles. Then place on the bottom of a roasting tray. After that, in a bowl mix the olive oil with the salt and black pepper, and then massage into the meat. Place the lamb onto the sliced onions and then put the tray into the pizza oven. We recommend cooking the lamb for 1 hr – 1 hr 20 mins for a 2kg leg, depending on how pink you like it. It’s always a good idea to use a temperature probe to check the internal temperature of the meat. We’re aiming for around 55°C – 60°C for medium, or up to 70°C if you prefer it more well done.

The Ultimate Mint Sauce

Okay, so this one you can’t cook in your Igneus Pizza Oven! But it would be a crime for us not to include our Ultimate Mint Sauce to go alongside the leg of lamb. The good news is, it’s so quick and easy to make and you can prepare it well in advance. You’ll need the following.

• 2 bunches of mint
• 150g of sugar
• 150ml of white wine vinegar
• 150ml of water
• 1 pinch of salt

Pick the leaves from the stalks and remember to keep the stalks. Blanch the leaves for 15 seconds in boiling water. Then plunge them straight into iced water to stop the cooking process. After a couple of minutes, drain and squeeze the leaves to remove the majority of the liquid. Now chop the leaves as finely as you can.

Next, add the vinegar, water, sugar and the reserved stalks to a pan and bring to the boil. As soon as it reaches boiling point, take the pan off the heat and check the seasoning. If you feel it needs a pinch of salt, at it at this stage. Leave the liquid to cool and then remove the stalks. Add in the chopped leaves and mix together. Add to a jar or Tupperware container, and store in the fridge.

Wood Fired Asparagus

Maybe this is a strange choice for your average roast dinner, but British asparagus is an incredible choice to accompany lamb. Cooked in a wood fired pizza oven really does elevate this humble vegetable as well. It’s bang at the start of the British asparagus season, so you’ll catch it at its sweetest right about now. Not only that, but it’s so easy to prepare.

Simply snap the ‘woody’ end of the asparagus off and discard. Add to a cast iron pan or roasting tin with a glug of olive oil, a knob of butter and some finely grated lemon zest and some parmesan cheese (optional). Then roast in the pizza oven for 10-15 minutes. Done!

Wood Fired Roast Potatoes

No roast dinner is complete without the addition of banging roast potatoes and trust us when we say nothing beats wood fired roast potatoes! But fear not, we already have a fantastic recipe for these which will make the perfect accompaniment to the leg of lamb. You can find the recipe here.

We hope you give some or all of these Easter Roast Dinner ideas a try, and we’d love for you to tag us in on our social channels so we can see your creations! However you’re spending the Easter bank holiday, whether you’re firing up your pizza oven or not, we hope you have a good one!

Thanks for reading!

Team Igneus