Survival Cooking

We have most everything we need to make basic meals at the hotel, and in some ways the kitchen is better laid out for food prep than our old kitchen at the house.  Still, some compromises have to be made, such as only having one tiny cutting board.  Hard to do much with one small cutting board.  Of course, you don't know what is missing until you reach for it.

A couple of weeks ago, I decided we should try and make a decent meal, especially since we living so close to the great food vendors in the Byward Market.  Though are fortunate at home to be able to shop at Saslove's Meat Market, I still think that Aubrey's in the market is the best butcher shop in town.  So we got a half leg of lamb and some nice locally grown vegetables form the market, and headed home to make dinner.

After putting the roast in the oven, it occurred to me that I was without any sort of meat thermometer to tell when the thing would be done.  To make matters yet more interesting, there were no oven mitts either, so I was not going to be taking the thing out every so often to tell when it was done.

I followed the easily summarized method of "Cook it till it is probably done, then let it rest until it is ready to serve".  I pulled it out of the oven when I thought it was finished, and confirmed the rough internal temperature with a fork the same way I'd test fish.  If you know me, you know I don't like to serve an overcooked (or undercooked) roast.  After the appropriate amount of resting time, it turned out to be the most tasty roast, and very satisfying for the cook.  If only I had a decent sized cutting board to use when carving the thing.