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Slow-braised lamb shoulder

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Sunday Supper

Slow-Braised Lamb Shoulder with Red Wine & Rosemary

By Matt Crombie | February 16, 2026

⏱ 4 hours 🍽 Serves 6 🔥 485 kcal per serving

There exists a particular kind of Sunday that demands nothing less than slow-braised lamb shoulder. The kind where rain streaks the windows and the hours stretch ahead with luxurious emptiness. When the kitchen becomes a sanctuary and time itself becomes an ingredient.

This is not a recipe for the hurried. Four hours in the oven cannot be rushed, cannot be microwaved into submission, cannot be substituted with a pressure cooker's mechanical urgency. The lamb needs those hours to surrender completely, for the collagen to melt into silk, for the meat to fall from the bone in wine-dark ribbons.

I learned this dish from a Greek butcher in Marrickville who insisted that lamb shoulder was the only cut worth braising. "The leg is for tourists," he said, wrapping two kilograms of bone-in shoulder in white paper. "The shoulder is for people who understand waiting."

"The shoulder is for people who understand waiting."

The Alchemy of Time

What happens in that slow oven is nothing short of alchemy. The red wine reduces to an almost syrupy intensity, the rosemary infusing everything it touches with its piney perfume. The vegetables—onions, carrots, celery—break down into a rough-hewn sauce that needs no thickening, no refinement.

This is peasant cooking elevated by patience. There is no cream, no butter basting, no complicated reduction. Just lamb, wine, vegetables, and time. The four most honest ingredients a cook can ask for.

Serve it with something simple that won't compete: creamy polenta, buttered potatoes, or good bread to soak up the sauce. A green salad dressed with lemon. Red wine, naturally—the same bottle you cooked with, if you've shown restraint.

Ingredients

Method

  1. Preheat your oven to 160°C. Score the lamb shoulder's fat cap in a crosshatch pattern and season generously with salt and pepper. Make small incisions in the meat and insert garlic slices and rosemary leaves.
  2. Heat olive oil in a large, heavy-based casserole pot over medium-high heat. Brown the lamb shoulder on all sides until deeply golden, about 8-10 minutes total. Remove and set aside.
  3. In the same pot, add onions, carrots, and celery. Cook for 5-6 minutes until softened and beginning to colour. The vegetables should pick up all the caramelised lamb flavour from the bottom of the pot.
  4. Pour in the red wine and bring to a vigorous simmer, scraping up any browned bits from the bottom. Let it reduce by half, about 5 minutes—this concentrates the flavour and burns off the harsh alcohol.
  5. Add the tinned tomatoes (crushing them with your hands as you add them), stock, bay leaves, and remaining rosemary sprigs. Return the lamb to the pot, nestling it into the vegetables. The liquid should come about halfway up the lamb.
  6. Bring everything to a gentle simmer, then cover with a tight-fitting lid and transfer to the oven. Braise for 3.5 to 4 hours, turning the lamb every hour, until the meat is fall-apart tender.
  7. Remove the lamb from the pot and tent loosely with foil to rest for 15 minutes. Meanwhile, skim any excess fat from the surface of the sauce. If the sauce seems thin, simmer it on the stovetop for 10 minutes to reduce.
  8. Pull the lamb into large chunks—it should require almost no effort—and serve in shallow bowls with the vegetables and plenty of sauce. Finish with a drizzle of good olive oil and a crack of black pepper.

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