How Long Will A Larger Cut Of Lamb Take To Cook For The Slow Roast 5-Spice Lamb?

Our answer

Nigella's Slow Roast 5-Spice Lamb With Chinese Pancakes (from AT MY TABLE) actually uses lamb shoulder rather than lamb leg, as this cut is marbled with plenty of fat and so is particularly good, and our preference, for slow roasting. However, lamb leg can also be slow roasted and you could probably use it for this recipe.

A 4kg (8 3/4 lbs) leg of lamb is extremely large and we assume it has the bone in. It may be more practical, if it is possible, to try and cut the leg into two parts of 2kg each. This would make it easier to individually wrap each part tightly in foil and would reduce the cooking time. Nigella's Herbed Leg Of lamb suggests a cooking time of 30 minutes per 500g plus 30 minutes extra for well done lamb. This suggests a cooking time of 2 1/2 hours for 2kg or 4 1/2 hours for 4kg. However, to be falling off the bone tender and with fork-shreddable meat, you would need to add extra cooking time. So we would estimate that a 2kg piece would need around 4-4 1/2 hours slow cooking in foil and a 4kg piece would need around 6-6 1/2 hours slow cooking in foil. After this you should follow the instructions for unwrapping the lamb and cooking it with the coating of honey. As lamb leg has less fat, you may also want to add a little liquid to the foil parcel to be sure that the leg doesn't dry out. You could add water or a splash of Chinese cooking wine. We would mention that as we have not tried this recipe with lamb leg, we are unable to guarantee the results.