Anne Morgan If malt vinegar is too sharp for you, Delia Smith’s mint sauce is her Spring Sauce for Lamb, for 6 people. You chop mint, spring onions and lettuce, then stir them into wine vinegar mixed with the same amount of cold water. You need only 5 minutes and no heat, so make it while the lamb rests.
This sauce comes from the herbs chapter of her Complete Cookery Course. Delia says her grandmother always served it with lamb, and the 1983 and 1992 editions use the same amounts.
The vinegar makes all the difference. She will not use malt vinegar, because she says it covers up the taste of the lamb. Instead, she waters down a milder wine vinegar.
Serve it with her roast leg of lamb, studded with garlic and rosemary. For a sweeter sauce, the FAQs give her two mint sauces made with redcurrant jelly.
Delia Smith’s Spring Sauce for Lamb
Course: SauceCuisine: BritishDifficulty: Easy6
servings5
minutes5
kcalA thin mint sauce with spring onion and lettuce in wine vinegar and water. It has no sugar and needs no cooking.
Ingredients
- For the sauce:
2 tablespoons chopped fresh mint
2 spring onions, very finely chopped
2 lettuce leaves, finely chopped
3 tablespoons wine vinegar
3 tablespoons cold water
Directions
- Chop: Chop the mint very finely, then do the same with the spring onions and the lettuce leaves.
- Mix: Put them in a small bowl with the wine vinegar and cold water, and stir well.
- Serve: Pour the sauce into a sauce boat, so everyone can help themselves.
Notes
- Never use dried mint here. Delia says it loses all its flavour and turns musty.
FAQs
Which mint is best for mint sauce?
Spearmint is best. Delia once grew several kinds of mint, but spearmint was the one she used most, so now she grows only that.
She calls it the mint for mint sauce, and she adds a couple of sprigs to boiling new potatoes too. Her potato salad with mint and chives is another good way to use it.
How much vinegar goes in mint sauce?
It depends which of her two versions you follow. Both are in the Complete Cookery Course, and both use wine vinegar, never malt.
In this recipe the vinegar and water are equal, 3 tablespoons of each, but her short note on serving lamb uses much less vinegar. It has 3 tablespoons of chopped mint, 1 tablespoon of wine vinegar and about 3 tablespoons of water.
She adds shredded lettuce and a little spring onion to that one too. So the two sauces are very alike, but the note has more mint and less vinegar.
When does Delia serve mint sauce?
Mostly in summer. Her Complete Cookery Course calls mint sauce a favourite with lamb in summer. Her Summer Collection adds that lamb is at its best in mid-summer, after the spring grazing.
At that time she serves the lamb plainly roasted, with just a sauce of young mint leaves. Later in the summer, she bakes it in foil with rosemary instead.
What is her redcurrant and mint sauce?
It goes with her baked leg of lamb in her Summer Collection, for 6. Put 3 tablespoons of redcurrant jelly and 3 tablespoons of red wine vinegar in a small pan. Whisk them over a gentle heat until the jelly melts.
Take the pan off the heat, stir in 4 tablespoons of chopped mint, then season it. Pour it into a jug, because it does not need to be warm.
What is her redcurrant, orange and mint sauce?
This is her own favourite with lamb, from the Complete Cookery Course, for 8. Break up 4 tablespoons of redcurrant jelly with a fork in a small bowl.
Mix in the grated rind of 1 orange and 1½ tablespoons of chopped mint, and it is ready. She calls it one of the quickest sauces in the world, but the jelly matters, so choose one with a high fruit content.
Does mint sauce need sugar?
Not in Delia’s version. The sauce on this card has no sugar at all, and her short mint sauce note leaves it out too.
When she wants a sweeter sauce, she uses redcurrant jelly instead, as in her two redcurrant sauces above. She says to buy an authentic jelly that is really made from redcurrants.
How long does mint sauce keep?
My own view is to make it on the day you eat it. Keep it covered in the fridge for a few hours at most, because the lettuce and spring onion go soft in the vinegar.
