The Meal To Impress Anyone

Valentine’s Day, boss dropping by, meeting in-laws for the first time: Nothing beats a “frenched” rack of lamb. “It’s one of those elegant dishes royalty ate,” Keller says. “It’s the most flavorful, tender part of the animal.”

On a properly frenched rack — in which the bones have been scraped clean of all muscle and fascia — graceful white fingers arc up beautifully from the crimson meat. Any good butcher can French a rack for you, but Keller encourages doing it yourself — not to save a few bucks, although you will, but for the pleasure of the process, and the pride of craftsmanship. This isn’t changing-your-own-oil stuff; it’s tying your own flies.

“To me this is what it’s all about,” Keller says. “Taking a whole rack and breaking it down, using your knife skills, transforming it into something beautiful, but also something satisfying and generous, and very luxurious. Your girlfriend may never even notice, except in a kind of heightened…”

“Awareness?” I offer.

“That’s it,” Keller says. “Awareness.”

The Complete Recipe:

Herb-Crusted Rack of Lamb

Ingredients

1 head of garlic

3 tbsp finely chopped parsley

1/2 tsp minced thyme

1 1/2 cups brioche (or any white bread) crumbs

8-bone rack of lamb (3 lb)

Kosher salt

Freshly ground black pepper

1/4 cup Dijon mustard

Step 1

Preheat oven to 425˚, wrap the head of garlic in foil, and roast for 40 minutes, until soft. Let cool, slice in half across the cloves, and squeeze each to remove

the soft brown roasted garlic within. For the persillade crust, combine 1 tbsp garlic with the parsley, thyme,

and bread crumbs,

and mix. It should be moist

enough to clump; if not, moisten with canola oil.

Step 2

Using a paring knife, french the bones and then remove all fat and fascia from the meat. Wrap the bones individually in aluminum foil. Set rack, bone side down, ribs facing away from you, on a sheet of parchment paper or plastic wrap. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Brush the meat with enough Dijon mustard to create a thin, translucent layer.

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Keller On…

Frenching the bones: “The idea is to scrape the bones completely bare, the way a dentist cleans plaque off teeth. Set the rack down fat-side up, bones to your right. With your knife perpendicular to the bones, cut through the fat cap to the base of the ribs, where they connect to the rack. Now slide the blade right, using the bones as a guide, until you’ve cut all the meat off the top of the ribs. Then just cut away every bit of meat between the ribs.”

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Step 3

Spread the crumb mixture onto the parchment paper in front of the rack, then bring the paper to the meat and press the crumbs into it.

Step 4

Set the lamb on a roasting rack in a roasting pan, put it

in the oven, and cook for

25 to 35 minutes, until the temperature in the center measures 128˚ to 130˚.

Step 5

Let the lamb rest in a warm place for about 20 minutes for medium-rare. Carve the rack into four two-bone chops. Sprinkle with salt and serve.

For gnocchi and asparagus side dish recipes, go to mensjournal.com/lambsides.

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Essential tool: The Paring Knife

The five-inch Mac PFK-50 Pro Paring Knife is narrow enough to slip easily through the muscle fascia on any cut of meat and short enough not to become awkward with a small, delicate rack of lamb. $67.50; macknife.com

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Key skill

Removing the Fat

If you try to press a persillade crust onto a lamb-rack’s fat cap, the fat will just melt during cooking, taking the crust with it. So spend some time rendering the meat a clean, bare crimson (see diagram below).

“You don’t have to get it all in one cut,” Keller says. “You’ll do it in lines, whatever you’re most comfortable with.”

Needless to say, this takes me a nervous eternity. And when the fat’s all gone, there’s a layer of muscle fascia — sometimes called “silver skin” — over the meat. That proves trickier to remove, but I finally get to the last strip.

“Now cut it off; there you go,” Keller says. “Perfect.”

He actually says that: “Perfect.” To me.

Step one

With the fat side up, bones toward you, insert the tip of your knife into the fat, about an inch from the right-hand edge of the rack, blade facing right. Slicing right, release a flap.

Step two

Hold flap and gently slice left under it. Repeat until rack is clean of fat and silver skin. Note: At one end there’s a layer of fascia beneath a layer of good meat. Do not remove that.

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Next: How to cook the perfect steak.

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This article first appeared in the August 2010 issue of Men’s Journal.