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Meat · In Afrikaans: Karoo-tjops

Karoo lamb chops

Thick lamb chops with rosemary, garlic and lemon, started on their fat edge and done over hot coals in ten minutes. Karoo lambs graze on aromatic semi-desert scrub, which is why this meat needs almost no seasoning.

Karoo lamb is a protected designation of origin. The sheep graze the semi-desert on Karoo scrub — salty, aromatic dwarf shrubs that season the meat long before it reaches a kitchen. Which is why the marinade here is short and the ingredient list thin.

Prep
15 min
On the fire
10 min
Serves
4
Effort
easy
Lamb chops over the coals, turned with the tongs
domdomegg · CC BY 4.0

How hot

Hot

You can hold your hand over the grid for 4 seconds · ≈ 200–230 °C

Every coal stage explained →

Which wood

Rooikrans

spicy, resinous

More on this wood →

When it goes on

The main round

The actual food: wors, chicken, fish, skewers.

Equipment: Grid

This line

Trekboers and Voortrekkers1652 to about 1900

The three-legged pot, sausage as a way of keeping meat, bread without an oven.

Method

  1. Bring the meat up to temperature

    Take the chops out of the fridge an hour before you eat — which is exactly when you light the fire. Cold meat takes too long on the outside before anything happens inside.

  2. Mix the rub

    Stir together oil, garlic, rosemary, thyme, lemon zest and chilli flakes. Rub it into the chops and leave them while the wood burns down. Salt only just before they go on — earlier and it draws water to the surface.

  3. Build two zones

    Rake the coals to one side and leave the other clear. Four seconds on the hand test over the hot side and you are ready.

  4. Fat edge first

    Stand the chops on their fat edge, leaning two together if need be, and hold them there for a minute. The fat crisps and drips away instead of causing flare-ups later.

  5. Sear

    Lay them flat and give three to four minutes a side over the hot zone. Turn exactly once. Do not press down with the tongs — that squeezes the juice into the fire.

  6. Let them come up

    If you want them further done, move them to the clear side for another two to three minutes. Pink is roughly 55 to 59 °C in the middle.

  7. Rest

    Five to ten minutes on a warm plate, loosely tented with foil. Then squeeze over the lemon and serve.

Tips

  • Thickness matters more than marinade. Under 2.5 cm you get either crust or the right doneness, but not both.
  • With time to spare, leave the chops in the rub for four hours or overnight. With Karoo lamb that is a matter of taste; with supermarket lamb it earns its keep.
  • Ina Paarman threads the chops onto skewers over the coal-free zone and bastes them repeatedly. It takes longer but builds noticeably more layers of flavour.
  • The classic accompaniment is spekboom salsa — spekboom leaves, cucumber, apple, red onion, oil, lemon, honey. Spekboom grows along every second road in the Eastern Cape.

There is little at a South African fire that people agree on faster than Karoo lamb. The sheep eat Karoo scrub out in the semi-desert, salty and resinous little bushes, and you can taste it. So the meat does not need treatment, it needs a decision: heat and time.

What makes the difference is the fat edge. Lamb fat is excellent when it is crisp and rancid when it stays soft. That is why the chops stand upright on the grid before they lie flat — one minute that saves the whole plate.

The rest is craft: hot coals, one turn, a rest. Put them on at four seconds on the hand test and leave them alone, and you get chops with a crust outside and pink inside. Flip them like pancakes and you get grey lamb.

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Total time
40 min
Serves
6
Heat of the coals
medium
Equipment
Hinged grid