A week ago, I made three recipes for dinner: Seared Lamb with Balsamic Sauce, Cracked Wheat-Currant Pilaf, and Spicy Chard. This meal entire meal was listed as a combination in Cooking Light magazine, and it actually did come together within 40 minutes, as listed in the description, as long as you had all of your chopping done ahead of time. I wish I could take credit for the order that I made these in, but honestly, the magazine suggested that I cook everything in this order.
I halved the amount of pilaf, and the amount of balsamic sauce. I actually only used 2 lamb chops for us, instead of 4, but I believe they were about 6oz or so each (as opposed to the 4oz listed in the recipe). I made the full amount of swiss chard because you can’t go wrong with vegetables (and I couldn’t figure out what else I would do with it if I didn’t cook it all right then).
I started by boiling the bulgur wheat and setting it aside. Next I seared the lamb chops in a small skillet. While they cooked, I sauteed the garlic and red pepper for the chard in a separate pan, added the chard and some vegetable broth, and let it cook for the 8 minutes the recipe called for. After approximately 7 minutes, the lamb chops were done so I put them on a plate and covered them with foil to keep them warm. (I may have put them in the oven at the lowest temperature possible, but I honestly can’t remember at this point.) Next I made the balsamic sauce. I find that I haven’t mastered getting the proper temperatures with the flames, because most of the liquid evaporates before the cooking time listed in the recipe is up. In any case, making the sauce was very easy and went very smoothly since it was the only thing I was actively cooking at the time.
Once the sauce was cooked, I added the currants and parsley to the bulgur wheat. I plated everything, and poured the sauce over the lamb.
I really enjoyed this meal. Alex really enjoyed the pilaf because of the currants. My favorite was the balsamic sauce. The spicy chard was tasty, and pretty because it was rainbow chard. (The red stems reminded me of beets! I was a little surprised at this.) I have decided that I like lamb loin chops – or at the very least, I liked them when I made this recipe. The pilaf has no broth or base flavor so I originally thought it lacked something, but I ended up eating it with the balsamic sauce anyway, so I think it made a great side dish just as it was. I really enjoyed the sauce – I find it difficult to go wrong with a combination of beef broth, red wine, garlic and onion, and the balsamic vinegar gave it an extra, savory taste.
I’ll make all of these again. I also highly recommend that you make the pilaf (and to a lesser extent, the chard) to go with the lamb. I thought that it was a very satisfying combination.
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