Buried Coal Mutton Leg

Ingredients

Equipment

• Large natural stone or tray
• Heavy-duty aluminum foil
• Charcoal pit
• Tongs

Instructions

1. 1

   Step 1: Prepare the leg

   Wash the whole mutton leg thoroughly and place it on a natural stone or tray.

2. 2

   Step 2: Marinate

   Rub the leg well with ginger-garlic paste, salt, red chili, green chili, garam masala, black pepper and butter, working it into the meat.

3. 3

   Step 3: Layer the foil

   Place the marinated leg on thick foil. Add whole onions, whole tomatoes, sliced ginger, whole garlic cloves, green chilies and coriander around it.

4. 4

   Step 4: Wrap

   Wrap the leg tightly in several layers of foil, keeping its natural leg shape intact.

5. 5

   Step 5: Bury in coals

   Place the wrapped leg in a bed of hot charcoal and cover it completely with more charcoal.

6. 6

   Step 6: Slow-cook and serve

   Slow-cook until the mutton becomes tender and fully cooked. Carefully remove it from the coals, open the foil, and serve hot with the roasted vegetables and natural juices.

7. 7

   Step 7: Why a whole leg buried in coals needs patience more than skill

   A whole mutton leg cooked this way asks for very little technique and a great deal of patience, and understanding why will keep you from opening the foil too early. A leg is a large, thick cut with bone, connective tissue and muscle all in one piece. Quick, fierce heat would char the outside long before the centre was cooked, and it would tighten the meat until it turned tough. Buried in coals, the leg gets the opposite: steady, surrounding heat at a moderate level, sealed inside several layers of foil with its marinade and vegetables. There is no direct flame on the meat, and nowhere for the juices to go except back into the meat and the vegetables around it. Over 2 to 2½ hours, that gentle enclosed heat slowly breaks down the tough tissue until the meat turns tender and fully cooked, and the roasted onions, tomatoes, garlic and ginger baste it in their own juices the whole time. That is also why the recipe keeps the leg's natural shape intact when wrapping it. A leg folded or squashed into a packet cooks unevenly — thin parts overcook while thick parts lag behind — while a leg wrapped in its own shape heats evenly from every side. The marinade works the same way: the ginger-garlic paste, salt, red chili, green chili, garam masala, black pepper and butter are rubbed well into the meat before wrapping, so they season it throughout the long cook rather than sitting on the surface. Butter in the rub matters here too, because it melts into the packet and keeps the meat basted as it cooks. The hardest part is judging when it is done without cutting the foil open again. Every opening lets heat and steam escape and adds time to the cook, so the recipe's skewer test is the right tool: a long metal skewer pushed through a small slit should slide into the thickest part with little resistance when the leg is ready. Keep a shovel or tongs nearby, as the tips suggest, to redistribute coals evenly around the packet as they burn down, because coals that collapse on one side leave that side undercooked. When the leg is tender, open the foil carefully and serve it hot with the roasted vegetables and natural juices — those juices are the sauce, and they carry the flavour of the whole cook.