Slow-roasted goat shoulder with Middle Eastern spices

Goat has a wonderful flavour of its own, and the shoulders lend themselves particularly well to a flavour-packed marinade and a long, slow roast.

This roasted goat shoulder serves eight - so dinner, and leftovers. Credit: Sharyn Cairns

• serves

  8

• prep

  15 minutes

• cook

  4 hours

• difficulty

  Easy

Why don’t we eat more goat in Australia? For some reason, we seem to have a cultural hang up about this delicious meat, opting instead for tried and tested lamb. It’s a crying shame I say! 

Ingredients

• 1.5 kg goat shoulder
• 60 ml (¼ cup) olive oil
• 4 cloves garlic
• 1 lemon, juiced and rind finely grated
• 1 bunch flat-leaf parsley
• 1 tbsp sumac
• 2 tsp black peppercorns, toasted
• 2 tsp cumin seeds, toasted
• 1 tsp fennel seeds, toasted
• 1 litre (4 cups) water

Marinating time: 6 hours or overnight

Instructions

Use a small, sharp knife to lightly score the goat shoulder all over, then season it generously with salt and pepper.

Combine the oil, garlic, lemon juice and rind, parsley and sumac in a blender and whizz everything into a smooth liquid.

In a mortar and pestle, combine the peppercorns, cumin and fennel seeds and grind into a course powder. Add the ground spices to the oil mixture and stir to combine.

Place the shoulder in a deep-sided roasting tray and massage the marinade all over the meat, cover the tray and refrigerate overnight to allow the flavours to infuse.

Remove the tray from the fridge.

Preheat the oven to 160˚C.

Pour the water into the roasting tray, then lay a piece of baking paper over the shoulder. Cover the tray with foil and roast for 3–4 hours - the meat will be moist and fall easily from the bone.

You can serve this with Paul's pickled onions. 

Photography by Sharyn Cairns. Styling by Lee Blaylock. Food preparation by Tiffany Page. Creative concept by Belinda So.

Paul West is the host of River Cottage Australia, 6pm weeknights on SBS and on SBS On Demand. For more recipes from Paul, click here.

Cook's Notes

Oven temperatures are for conventional; if using fan-forced (convection), reduce the temperature by 20˚C. | We use Australian tablespoons and cups: 1 teaspoon equals 5 ml; 1 tablespoon equals 20 ml; 1 cup equals 250 ml. | All herbs are fresh (unless specified) and cups are lightly packed. | All vegetables are medium size and peeled, unless specified. | All eggs are 55-60 g, unless specified.

Why don’t we eat more goat in Australia? For some reason, we seem to have a cultural hang up about this delicious meat, opting instead for tried and tested lamb. It’s a crying shame I say!