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CarbSmart.com is proud to bring you two lamb dishes that won’t stretch your pocket-book, or wallet, beyond recognition. Lamb can get very expensive for premium cuts like loin, loin chops, and rack-of-lamb. But utilizing the so-called “cheap cuts”, such as shoulder and leg of lamb, you can comfortably feed a family of four for under ten bucks. Now, you have to use your noggin’, but we’re showing you it is possible!
Lamb refers to sheep meat from an animal less than one year old. When you harvest meat from an animal over a year, it’s referred to as mutton. Most lamb in our stores and restaurants come from Australia, New Zealand, or America. By law, American lamb can have no antibiotics or artificial growth hormones during its lifetime. It’s a sweet, mildly flavored meat with a texture similar to veal or young beef, and truly most lamb is tender solely by age alone.
At the time of this writing, we bought lamb shoulder chops from $3.49/lb to $3.99/lb. We routinely buy beautiful, meaty chops with the round bone, which are superior to the chops that have long sinew striations and long bones inside the chop. The shoulder chops with the round bones are meatier, more tender, and milder. We also get ground lamb made from trimmings that come from the total animal for $5.98/lb. We find leg of lamb for $5.49/lb, which you can also trim and grind yourself—saving you about $0.50/lb for a bit of extra work. That’s actually what we do, because I like to know what’s going into our ground meat. But feel free to experiment with pre-packaged ground lamb.
Serving sizes are approximated to 4 ounces per person, raw. Most lamb cuts have less than 10% loss through cooking, so you are still consuming about 28-32 g of protein per lamb meal, per person. That’s a nutritional bargain; especially since low carb living is a high fat, protein adequate, low carbohydrate lifestyle.
The one caveat of cooking lamb? Do NOT over-cook! Lamb is perfectly cooked at rare to medium rare, which is an internal temperature of 125-145°. Use your personal preference. We cook ground lamb a bit longer—to about medium, and cook chops, steaks, and roasts to around 130°. At those temperatures, the meat will be very tender and juicy.
We hope you’ll give preparing lamb without going on the “lamb” a shot! (Yes, we know lam is spelled l-a-m, but we wanted to know if you did!) Lamb makes a great break from the low carb routine, and if you’ve been following along with Budget Low Carb Cooking, you will know that most of our meat is purchased as close to $1.00/lb as we can find it through sales and coupons—so a splurge-meal with a more expensive meat source won’t break the budget.
Two Solid Lamb Recipes Perfect for BLC
Enjoy!
PrintLow-Carb Spicy Lamb Feta Wrap
For a delicious and healthy Ketogenic, low-carb option, enjoy our Spicy Lamb Feta Wrap for high-quality proteins, healthy fats, and a variety of low-carb vegetables. You can enjoy these satisfying flavors and textures while helping you maintain a healthy lifestyle by limiting unhealthy carbs.
- Prep Time: 15 mins
- Cook Time: 25 mins
- Total Time: 40 mins
- Yield: 4 1x
Ingredients
- 1 pound lamb chop, shoulder
- 1 tablespoon lemon zest
- 4 cloves garlic
- 3 tablespoons fresh rosemary leaves, or 1/2 tablespoon dried
- 3 tablespoons Italian flat leaf parsley, or 1 tablespoon dried
- 2 tablespoons fresh thyme leaf — or 1 teaspoon dried
- 2 tablespoons fresh oregano — or 1/2 teaspoon dried
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice — freshly squeezed
- 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
- 1/4 cup olive oil
- 2 teaspoons kosher salt
- 2 teaspoons black pepper, freshly ground
- 1/2 cup feta cheese, crumbled
- 2 cups spring mix
- 4 Revolutionary Wraps (Recipe at )
- 1/2 cup Spicy Sriracha Mayo (Recipe at )
- 32 grape tomatoes
Instructions
- Wash and dry herbs. Strip leaves off the stems and roughly chop. Zest lemon and reserve. Squeeze 1/2 zested lemon and reserve juice. Press garlic cloves.
- Rub both sides of lamb chops with pressed garlic. Season with fresh herbs, salt, and freshly ground pepper.
- Sprinkle both sides with Worcestershire sauce and olive oil.
- Cover and refrigerate lamb chops for at least 30 minutes, or up to 24 hours.
- When ready to grill, take lamb out of ice box. I like meat to be cold when grilling because it gives me the time necessary over blazing hot heat (ignite or extra high) to brown the outside of the meat without moy-der-izing (murderizing) the inside and over cooking it.
- We cook with a propane grill. The instructions would be the same for a gas grill. Feel free to use a charcoal grill or a George Foreman type of grill, or a grill pan. The recipe is flexible! You will have to adjust your cooking method accordingly.
- Grilling Instructions for Propane Grill: Heat grill on ignite with the lid closed for about 3-5 minutes. You want it hot, hot, hotty devil, hot!
- Place lamb chops over direct heat. Close lid. Don’t be scared.
- Cook for 1 minute, lid down.
- Open lid after 1 minute and cook for a second minute on that side with the lid up.
- DON’T you dare touch that meat! Don’t touch it!
- After two minutes on side 1, pour any marinade and herbs left on the plate used during marinating the lamb over the exposed side of lamb chops. (That’s the side that’s facing you while on the grill. You’re lookin’ at it!)
- Using tongues, flip lamb chops. Close lid and cook for 1 minute, lid down. Try to use tongues and not a fork. Piercing the meat with a fork makes all the juices run out quicker!
- Open lid after 1 minute and cook for a second minute on that side with the lid up. Again, resist the urge to fiddle with your lamb chops.
- It’s now been 4 minutes, 2 more minutes of cooking to go.
- Use tongues to flip lamb chops back over onto side 1, rotating lamb chop about 45 degrees when flipping.
- Close lid and cook for 1 minute, lid down.
- Open lid after 1 minute, use tongues to flip lamb chop over onto side 2, again rotating chop 45 degrees.
- Close lid and cook for 1 minute, lid down.
- Six minutes total cooking time over direct heat on the ignite setting, which should be the hottest setting on your grill, and times up! You’re done! So are the lamb shoulder chops.
- Remove lamb chops from grill onto a clean plate and turn off grill.
- Allow lamb chops to rest for 5 minutes prior to slicing. When ready to serve, slice meat thinly off of bones. Serve 3-4 ounces of cooked meat per person.
Notes
Exchanges: 0 Grain(Starch); 2 Lean Meat; 1/2 Vegetable; 0 Fruit; 0 Non-Fat Milk; 4 Fat; 0 Other Carbohydrates.
Sure, these lamb chops taste the best, and most closely match the recipe I describe, when using the precise combination of fresh herbs in the recipe, but the recipe is flexible! Most of my recipes are flexible! If you don’t have fresh herbs and are using dried herbs, use ½ to 1/3 of the quantity called for in the recipe. No Big Deal!
If you don’t have all the herbs, or don’t like the taste of a certain herb, omit it and use what you have! It will still taste delicious! I frequently use fresh herbs because I have them growing in pots on the patio – they’re free and give a great, fresh flavor to food, but dried works just fine too. Also, the taste of a fresh herb isn’t as aggressive. Many times you may think you hate a particular herb when it’s dried, but may actually love it in the fresh state!
As much as 1/2 of the herb crust is lost during the grilling process. You could very easily subtract 1 gram of carbs for cooking loss.
Feel free to use a ready-made low carb wrap. There are many that taste great. But, the trade-off is they all have soy in them. The Fluffy Chix Cook Revolutionary Wraps are a decent, soy-free wrap alternative that allows you to pick up a wrap with your hands.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 4 oz.
- Calories: 762
- Sugar: 0
- Sodium: 1748
- Fat: 65
- Carbohydrates: 11
- Fiber: 3
- Protein: 36
- Cholesterol: 276
Revolutionary Wrap
Cost: $4.90 Per Serving: $0.41 These low carb wraps store well in the fridge and also freeze just fine. They make a great sandwich wrap, no soy involved—are low, low, low carb and cheap, too!
- Prep Time: 15 mins
- Cook Time: 30 mins
- Total Time: 45 mins
- Yield: 12 1x
Ingredients
- 8 large eggs — separate out yolks
- 1 1/8 cups mozzarella cheese, part skim milk — shredded
- 1/2 cup cottage cheese
- 3/4 cup Parmesan cheese — grated
- 2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
- 1/2 teaspoon granulated garlic
- 1/2 teaspoon onion powder
- 1/4 teaspoon Kosher salt
- 1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1 tablespoons rosemary, fresh — or 1/2 tablespoon dried
- 1/3 cup protein powder, natural flavor, Designer Whey Brand — (about 5-6 Tbsp or 26 grams)
- 1/8 cup coconut flour – Bob’s Red Mill
- 1/8 cup oat fiber
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 325°.
- Separate eggs into clean, dry bowls.
- Cream cottage cheese in a small food processor until almost smooth. Shred mozzarella cheese. To egg yolk bowl, add cheeses, mustard.
- Combine dry ingredients: protein powder, coconut flour and oat fiber. (You may substitute 1/4 cup of whole grain flour or 1/8 cup of ground psyllium husks, finely ground in your coffee grinder if you don’t have oat fiber.) Add all seasonings except cream of tartar. Stir to combine.
- Whip egg whites until they become frothy. Add cream of tartar. Continue to beat with an electric mixer until whites become stiff and no longer slide in a bowl. (Hint: Fluffy Chix like to use a glass or stainless bowl to whip egg whites. Make sure your beaters and bowl are both scrupulously clean and oil free.)
- After beating egg whites, beat egg yolk mixture for about 2 minutes. Mixture should be pale and fairly smooth, although there will still be a few lumps of cheese.
- Add dry ingredients to egg yolk mixture and beat until well combined.
- Fold egg whites into yolk mixture in three additions. You can be rough with the first addition. The first addition simply “loosens” the yolk mixture and lightens it. The second and third additions of egg white should be gentle folding motions. Try not to deflate the batter. Work quickly to keep the eggs from deflating.
- Spoon 1/3 batter onto parchment lined 14×18-inch baking sheet. Smooth out as evenly as possible. Bake at 325° for 20 minutes. Check after 12 minutes. Don’t overcook. Once done, remove and let rest. Cut wraps into 4 even pieces and use for sandwich wraps. If they are too brittle to roll, place them in a sealed baggie for a couple of hours. The wraps will become flexible again if you did not let them over-cook. I bake 2 sheets on the top rack and 1 sheet on the middle rack of the oven and rotate one the pans half way through cooking. (Sam’s has 14×18-inch baking sheets in packages of 2 for a little over $10.00. Great buy, great tool.)
Notes
You can also use this batter to make Revolutionary Rolls and Focaccia Bread, but let’s save those instructions for another day.
(Optional and not included in nutritional information or ingredients: Top rolls with 1/4 tsp of your favorite seeds: sesame; caraway; poppy seed; chia; or add a seed mixture such as sunflower, sesame, flax, and caraway. Your choice! Get creative and simply add the extra nutritional information into your base recipe.)
Serving Ideas: Use to make sandwich wraps, gyros, and tortillas with many different fillings.
These are Fluffy Chix favorite basic Revolutionary batter for everything from hamburgers to hotdogs, po’ boys, wraps, and pizza! I will be forever grateful to Dr. Atkins and his lovely wife, Veronica, for inspiring the riff on their original recipe. We change the recipe up all the time depending on our mood. Change the cheese. Change the seed toppings. Change the spices. Make them sweet by omitting the savory spices and adding your favorite flavorings and sugar substitutes. Change the protein powder to a sweet powder. The sky is the limit here. You own it! Make this recipe yours!
We sometimes “tent” the bread and rolls while cooking to keep them from getting too browned before having a chance to cook through. To some, when they brown too much, this bread can become eggy-tasting.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1
- Calories: 128
- Sodium: 372
- Fat: 7
- Carbohydrates: 4
- Fiber: 2
- Protein: 12
- Cholesterol: 157
Spicy Sriracha Mayonnaise
Cost: $3.63 Per Serving: $0.38 Homemade Mayonnaise is lightened up using Greek Yogurt and given a bold new flavor with the addition of garlic and spicy Sriracha Sauce.
- Prep Time: 10 mins
- Cook Time: 10 mins
- Total Time: 20 mins
- Yield: 10 1x
Ingredients
- 1 large egg yolk
- 2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
- 1/2 teaspoon Worcestershire Sauce
- 2 tablespoons lemon juice
- 1 clove garlic — peeled and pressed
- 1/8 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1/8 teaspoon black pepper — freshly ground
- 3/4 cup olive oil, extra light, Bertolli — Bertolli extra light recommended
- 1/4 cup Greek yogurt
- 2 tablespoons Sriracha sauce
Instructions
- Combine first seven ingredients in the bowl of a small food processor or blender. Pulse to combine.
- Turn processor on and begin drizzling olive oil into emulsion in a slow trickle. Watch the bowl to make sure the oil is being consumed. It will look creamy and homogenous. If you are pouring too quickly, you will see liquid oil in the bowl spinning around outside the emulsified mayonnaise. If that happens, stop pouring in olive oil and pulse processor or blender until mayonnaise looks emulsified, then resume incorporating olive oil.
- Add mayonnaise to Greek yogurt. Stir thoroughly to combine. Taste for salt and pepper and adjust to taste.
- Stir in Sriracha Sauce (sometimes called Rooster Sauce) until well-combined.
- Cover and refrigerate up to a week.
Notes
Serving Ideas: Serve on hamburgers and sandwiches, as a dipping sauce for chicken fingers, and as a salad dressing.
If you hate the flavor of extra light olive oil, feel free to use a light oil of your choice such as rice bran oil, safflower oil, or Canola oil. Once you make this delicious spicy mayonnaise, you will know the secret of homemade mayo and how easy it is to make. It takes seconds, keeps for a week to 10 days, and tastes better than any mayo out of a jar. The best thing about it is…it’s SOY FREE!!! Yippee!
The Greek yogurt isn’t strictly necessary, but it does extend the mayo and drop the calories per tablespoon if you’re looking to economize on condiments.
(Note: Those of you who are immune compromised, please use pasteurized eggs in the shell available at your grocery store. We do not recommend using raw eggs due to potential risk of contamination. To lessen risk, choose true, free range chickens in place of battery eggs. The food police made me say this.)
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 2 tablespoons
- Calories: 82
- Sodium: 52
- Fat: 9
- Carbohydrates: 1
- Fiber: trace
- Protein: trace
- Cholesterol: 12
Pizza with Moroccan Lamb Sausage, Artichoke Hearts, Olives and Roasted Tomatoes
Cost: $8.44 Per Serving: $2.11 This is a delicious and exotic pizza to celebrate the spring thaw. Who says you can’t have pizza on a low carb diet?
- Prep Time: 10 mins
- Cook Time: 30 mins
- Total Time: 40 mins
- Yield: 4 1x
Ingredients
- 6 servings Revolutionary Focaccia Bread–or a low carb wrap or flat bread
- 4 tablespoons olive oil
- 4 cloves garlic–pressed
- 6 ounces mozzarella cheese, part skim milk
- 2 servings Moroccan Lamb Sausage–1/3 of the recipe (Recipe Follows)
- 1/2 cup artichoke hearts–14 ounce can
- 12 alamata olives, pitted and halved
- 12 grape tomatoes
- 1/8 cup Parmesan cheese–grated
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400°.
- Make a recipe of Revolutionary Focaccia bread as written but instead of baking it in a square Pyrex pan, line a 14×18-inch baking sheet with parchment paper and evenly spread batter onto it. Bake per instructions, for 35-40 minutes or until done, tenting with aluminum foil to prevent over-browning. Remove from oven and cut into 2 pieces. Use one half pan per pizza. This can be made ahead and even frozen.
- Make a paste with garlic cloves and olive oil. Brush onto crust, including the edges. Sprinkle Parmesan Cheese around the edges of the crust. Top with mozzarella, lamb sausage, artichoke hearts, Kalamata olives, and grape tomatoes.
- Bake at 400° until cheese is melted and tomatoes are roasted.
- Serve immediately.
Notes
Serving Ideas: Serve with a simple green salad with cucumbers, purple onions, and house vinaigrette.
Assuming you have the Revolutionary Focaccia and lamb sausage made in advance, you can have this pizza ready and on plates before the pizza guy could even make it to your front door.
This is a delicious take on pizza. The focaccia bread makes a great pizza base for very few carbs. The homemade lamb sausage is the bomb.
If you don’t mind a bit of soy and gluten, you can simplify life even more by using a pre-packaged low carb flat bread as the pizza base. But since I try to avoid the main sources of both, the Revolutionary Focaccia Bread works great.
I just can’t say enough about this pizza. It’s hard to believe you can eat lamb, artichoke hearts, and Kalamata olives on a budget. These days, it’s difficult to buy high carbage, delivery pizza for less than $10.00 and here you have a 4-topping, gourmet pizza which easily feeds a family of four for less than nine bucks.
All you need is a simple and cheap side salad and this meal is done!
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 2 slices (1/4 pizza)
- Calories: 660
- Sodium: 1453
- Fat: 48
- Carbohydrates: 13
- Fiber: 4
- Protein: 46
- Cholesterol: 371
Moroccan Lamb Sausage
Cost: $7.98 Per Serving: $1.33 This spicy blend of herbs and heat makes a great pan sausage suitable for breakfast or dinner. Eat them as patties or lamb burgers, or use to replace the toppings on pizza.
- Prep Time: 10 mins
- Cook Time: 30 mins
- Total Time: 40 mins
- Yield: 6 1x
Ingredients
- 1/8 cup green bell pepper — finely chopped
- 1/8 cup onion — finely chopped
- 4 cloves garlic — pressed
- 1/8 cup Italian parsley — chopped
- 1 pound ground lamb
- 1/2 pound ground beef, 80/20, raw
- 2 tablespoons paprika
- 1 teaspoon ground cumin
- 1 teaspoon ground coriander
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1 1/2 teaspoons Kosher salt
- 1 teaspoon black pepper
- 2 tablespoons Sambal oelek — or Sriracha (also called Rooster Sauce)
- 2 egg yolks
- 1/4 cup ice water
Instructions
- Place bell pepper, onion, pressed garlic, and parsley in bowl of food processor fitted with the S-blade. Pulse until veggies are finely pureed. Crumble ground lamb and beef into the onion mixture in the bowl of the food processor. Add remaining ingredients.
- Pulse until lamb mixture is well combined and the liquid of the egg yolks and ice water are incorporated. Don’t worry if there are still small bits of ice. Don’t overwork.
- Remove from food processor and cook immediately. You can form a roll and wrap in plastic wrap. Tightly sealing the ends of the “casing” with butchers twine and poach sausage for 20 minutes in a hot water bath or until lamb sausage registers 165° in the center. Remove from plastic wrap and sauté lamb in olive oil until golden.
- Or simply sauté sausage as you would hamburger and cook until done. Use to top salads, feta wraps, and pizzas.
- You can also form patties and eat as you would a hamburger or a breakfast sausage.
Notes
Serving Ideas: Use to make lamb burgers, or as breakfast sausage with eggs and roasted tomatoes. Or use to top pizzas, wraps, and salads.
This is such a different take on homemade sausage. The lamb and Moroccan spices give it a spicy and sultry taste. The egg yolks act as an emulsifier and add much-needed fat, while the ice water helps the texture of the sausage and keeps the lamb from getting too hot in the bowl of the food processor.
You can make this sausage by hand, just be sure to finely chop your veggies. Use ice-cold water to replace the ice water. Mix with your hands until everything is smooth and incorporated.
We love this as a topping on low carb pizza!
For an added surprise, about a 1/4 cup of coarsely chopped pistachios is a delicious addition, if your carb budget and pocket book allow them.
Nutrition
- Calories: 346
- Sodium: 655
- Fat: 28
- Carbohydrates: 3
- Fiber: 1
- Protein: 21
- Cholesterol: 153
More Low-Carb Recipes & Articles by Susie T. Gibbs.
I may be blind but I don’t see an oven temp. The original site that you referenced says 325 so is that the temp you use for the Rev Wraps? Thanks!
Hi and so sorry for the oversight! I will go correct that and you are indeed correct. Bake at 325 degrees!!
Thanks!
Susie
Thank you!
You’re welcome and hope you like it!!!