What Is Lamb and How Can I Use It?

Leg of lamb is the whole hind leg of the animal. It is the big roast at the center of Easter and Passover tables across the Mediterranean and beyond, lean for lamb but full of flavor, and large enough to feed a crowd from one cut.

You buy it two ways. Bone-in gives you the best flavor and a dramatic roast to carve at the table. Boneless (often butterflied) cooks faster, lays flat for the grill, and is far easier to slice.

A whole bone-in leg runs 6 to 9 pounds (2.7 to 4 kg) and feeds eight to ten. Ask the butcher to remove the aitch bone for cleaner carving.

Ground lamb is lamb minced for cooking, fattier and far more flavorful than ground beef. That fat and the deep, slightly grassy taste of lamb make it the backbone of koftas, kebabs, and meatballs from the Middle East across the Mediterranean to India and North Africa.

Most ground lamb runs around 80 percent lean, often from the shoulder. The fat keeps it juicy and carries spice well, which is why it rarely needs the binders leaner mince does.

For lamb the meat itself, see lamb. This page is about the ground form and what to do with it.

Lamb rib chops are the small, tender chops cut from the rack of lamb, one per rib. Each is a nugget of fine-grained loin meat sitting on a long curved rib bone, which is why they get frenched (scraped clean) and served as lollipop chops at restaurants.

They are the most tender cut on the animal and the most forgiving to cook fast. Shoulder and shank need hours. A rib chop just wants high heat and a few minutes a side.

For general lamb buying and the case against well-done lamb, see lamb. This page is about the rib chops specifically.

Lamb shoulder is the hard-working front section of the animal, marbled with fat and threaded with connective tissue. That makes it tough when rushed and meltingly tender when given time. It is the braising and slow-roasting cut, and it carries far more flavor than the lean leg.

It also costs less than leg of lamb, often a good bit less, which is why it shows up in stews and curries the world over. You buy it boneless and rolled, bone-in, or cubed for stew.

For general lamb handling and doneness, see lamb. This page is about the shoulder.

Rack of lamb is the rib roast of the lamb, a row of eight ribs cut from the rib section with the tender eye of meat running along the bones. It is the most elegant cut in the whole animal and the one restaurants charge the most for.

Yet it is genuinely easy to cook at home.

The meat is fine-grained and mild for lamb, with a clean richness rather than the strong gaminess of shoulder or leg. Bought trimmed and frenched, it looks like a crown of bare white bones above a neat strip of rosy meat.

A single rack feeds two to three people as a main, which is why it shows up so often as a dinner-for-two or small-celebration centerpiece.

A lamb shank is the lower portion of the leg, the section just above the hoof on the front or hind quarter. It is tough, sinewy meat wrapped around a single bone, and that toughness is exactly the point.

Shanks are dense with connective tissue and collagen. Cook them slowly and that collagen melts into gelatin, leaving meat that slides off the bone and a sauce with real body.

This is a cheap, humble cut that eats like a luxury once you treat it right. One shank is a generous single serving, so plan on buying one per person.

Lamb stew meat is lamb cut into bite-sized cubes for slow, wet cooking. It usually comes from the shoulder or the leg, the harder-working muscles that are full of connective tissue and flavor but too tough to cook quickly.

Give those cubes a long, gentle braise and the collagen melts into gelatin, turning chewy meat fork-tender and the cooking liquid rich and glossy.

That makes it the backbone of slow-cooked dishes around the world. Irish stew leans on it, as do a Moroccan tagine and a Persian khoresh, and the cubes are the starting point for Indian rogan josh, all built on lamb and plenty of time.

A boneless leg of lamb is the whole back leg with the bone removed, sold either tied into a tidy roast or opened out flat. That flat sheet of meat is called a butterflied leg, and it's the form that makes this cut so flexible.

Without the bone, the leg cooks faster and far more evenly, and carving is no contest: you just slice across the grain. It's a generous, lean roast with deep flavor, the kind of centerpiece that anchors a holiday table without demanding much technique.

Lamb loin is the tender strip of meat that runs along the back of the lamb, between the rib (rack) and the leg. It is lean and fine-grained, with a mild, sweet lamb flavor that is far gentler than shoulder or leg.

You meet it in two main forms. Loin chops are small T-bone-shaped cuts with a nugget of loin on one side and a sliver of tenderloin on the other; the boneless loin is a slender, even cylinder ideal for roasting or stuffing.

Either way, this is a quick-cooking, premium cut. Treat it like a fine steak, not a braise.

Lamb shoulder chops are cut across the shoulder of the lamb, giving you a flat, bone-in chop with several muscles, a streak of connective tissue, and good marbling.

They are bigger and fattier than the dainty rib or loin chops, and far cheaper. Many cooks think they taste better for it.

Two common styles exist: the round-bone or arm chop, cut from the arm with a cross-section of the round leg bone, and the blade chop, which includes a piece of the shoulder blade. Both are flavorful and forgiving.

Because they come from a hard-working muscle, shoulder chops have more flavor and more chew than premium chops. That makes them ideal for cooks who want real lamb taste without paying rack-of-lamb prices.