As much I enjoy the glorious sunshine and salt-sprayed beach days of summer, much of which coincides with school holidays in Australia, I do still look forward to winter. Crisp mornings and chilly nights call for warm boots, scarves, coats and flavoursome comfort food that warms the house as it cooks, as well our our bellies. 


So to herald the first day of winter – and to recover from our usual Saturday consisting of three school sporting matches, piano lessons and an afternoon of music practice – I decided to make a slow cooked, fragrant meal for all seven of us to enjoy. Slow Roasted Lamb Racks, Aromatic Rice and Greek Style Salad with Natural Yoghurt. I also warmed up Infinity Bakery’s wholemeal sourdough rolls purchased from the Norton Street Grocer, to mop up the lamb and salad dressing juices.

First dish needing attention was the lamb. I turned on the oven to a conventional setting at 125 degrees. While that was warming, I rubbed four meaty lamb racks (16 cutlets in all) with a blend of dried oregano and ground cumin (1 teaspoon of each), sweet paprika and sumac (1/2 teaspoon of each) and the juice of a lemon. Each cutlet was also well seasoned with sea salt, then placed in a ceramic baking dish with one cup of red wine. Before placing into the preheated oven, I covered the dish tightly with a double layer of aluminium foil and then left the lot to bake for three hours. 

After three house of slow baking, I removed the foil and ramped up the heat to 200 degrees for another 15 minutes, just to crisp up the top of the lamb racks. I served this up on a warmed platter with some of the juices drizzled over the top and we ate immediately. The meat had deepened in colour due to the wine, and fell away from the bones, melting in our mouths because of this gentle cooking method and the superb quality of the meat.  

My Aromatic Rice is hugely popular with my little ones who would be happy to just eat this with natural yoghurt spooned on top. It is a great accompaniment for many dishes, especially chicken or lamb. The recipe can be found in my food blog entry Aromatic Weeknight Meal on Tuesday May 14. 

Feta cheese, a punnet of sweet grape tomatoes, two long juicy Telegraph cucumbers and 200 grams of fat green olives, all dressed with a little red wine and olive oil provided additional vitamins, flavour, texture and freshness to the meal. This is such a quick and satisfyingly tasty salad, that piled on top of wood-fired bread, it can in fact become a meal in itself in less chilly weather. 

An abundant fruit salad made with this season’s fruit selection of juicy oranges, kiwi fruits, creamy bananas, crisp Pink Lady Apples, Imperial mandarins and Packham pears was a perfect finish to a Saturday night family feast. Now all we need is a Sunday morning sleep in…fingers crossed!