How to cook the perfect Lamb Shank Ragu

Hi guys, Kieran here from Q ‘n Up BBQ and today I’m going to be showing you how to make one of my favourite dishes for home-smoked lamb shank ragu.

First, we’re going to fire up the PK Grill.

I like to use a chimney to start up my charcoal, then dump the lit fuel into the PK Grill once it’s red hot. You can start this fuel with firelighters and newspapers, or you can use the Flaming Coals charcoal starter wands (which is my preference).

Once the fuel is hot, dump into one side of the PK Grill, then place a couple of wood chunks over the top – I like to use cherry for lamb.

While the smoker is getting hot, let’s start with seasoning some vegetables that we’ll smoke beneath the lamb. We’ve got some quartered onions, whole tomatoes, mushrooms & garlic. We’re just going to toss them in olive oil, salt, pepper and some dried oregano. We’ll set that aside and prepare the lamb.

Here we have a couple of lamb shanks. Personally, I prefer untrimmed shanks, but you can use frenched ones too if that’s all you can find.

We’re going to season these now; I can’t go past the Butchers Axe Hunter rub. It’s sweet, savoury, herby – everything that lamb seems to love!

Next, we have this tray that we’re going to use to simmer some red wine. This is also going to act as our heat shield. A whole bottle will do the trick! Add some bay leaves into the mix too.

The smoker seems to be getting pretty hot now. Our tray of red wine will be placed on the grill. As they cook & caramelise, the juices should fall into our tray of red wine.

Next, well place the shanks on the opposite side of the charcoal (in-direct cooking).

I like to cook these from about 325F to 375F (or 160C to 190C), for about two hours at first, just until we get some colour on the lamb and the vegetables go soft.

Now the shanks have some decent colour, the vegetables are soft and the red wine is simmering nicely and slowly.

We’re going to remove the lamb & vegetables, place them in the tray of red wine. Feel free to mash up the vegetables a little bit. We’ll wrap this tight in foil now and place it back in the PK Grill, keeping the temperature up fairly high to cook through.

The lamb will be ready when it starts to probe soft – at this stage, we’ll remove the foil from the tray, stir things around a little and continue cooking for another 5-10 minutes to thicken up the sauce. Once you’re happy with the consistency, it’s a great idea to allow this to rest for 5 minutes, covered loosely. Shred the meat off the bone and mix through. Serve up with your favourite pasta, plenty of sauce, plenty of fresh parmesan and you’re good to go! 

by: Kieran Bianco