There’s nothing better than coming to your garrison from a long raid and enjoying a hearty home cooked meal. Even before I started playing WoW, I was always fascinated by the robust recipe options offered throughout the game. Choosing to level up the cooking profession was definitely a no-brainer for me  because of my interest of mercilessly killing virtual wildlife and throwing their meat over a roaring flame. MEAT GOOD.

LOOK AT ALL THIS POTENTIAL MEAT!

 I guess that it’s fitting that I rolled as a hunter in this game.

Appropriate title: the Butcher

Since my local butcher doesn’t offer River Beast, I had to choose a substitute. I decided to go with lamb as my meat of choice. I personally love lamb and its slight gamy flavor. If you’re not a fan of lamb, feel free to use beef. You may have to adjust the cook time and quantity of liquid since typically larger than lamb shanks.

There’s something special about red wine and red meat. That enchanting aroma that gently wafts through your home as the meat slowly cooks in a bath comprised of its own fatty juices and wine is just magical... Excuse me while I get a bucket for all of this drool.

UNIT COMPOSITION

1. salt
2. pepper
3. 6 cloves of garlic
4. 1/2 tablespoon of butter
5. 1 cup of red wine
6. 1/2 cup of beef stock
7. 2 lbs of lamb shank, french trimmed (~4 lamb shanks)
8. 2 carrots, sliced
9. 3 parsnips, sliced
10. OPTIONAL: parsley

BUILD ORDER

Prep time for this is about 25 minutes, or up to 45 minutes if you plan to french trim your lamb shanks. Cook time is ~1 hour, 45 minutes. This makes 4 servings.

Just to note, french trimming is completely optional! It’s really only for presentation purposes.

If you’re going to french trim your lamb shanks on your own, you’re going to want a very sharp paring knife. Here’s a tutorial I used.

Basically, you’ll want to make an incision around bone at the very end of the shank. Then, cut into the meat, and remove about 1″ of it. Scrape off any excess fat/tendon away from the bone until it’s fairly clean. When cooking, the meat will slide down from the bone.

OPENING

1. Season your lamb with salt and pepper.
2. Put a pan on high heat and add in your butter.
3. Sear the lamb for about 30 seconds each side, or until brown.
4. Place lamb in a large baking dish. Pour in your red wine and stock. You should have enough liquid to cover 3/4 of the lamb shanks.

MID GAME

1. Preheat your oven to 350° F.
2. Place your garlic in the baking dish.
3. Place the entire baking dish in the oven and bake for 1 hour.

LATE GAME

1. After an hour, flip over the lamb shanks.
2. Add in your chopped vegetables and continue baking for the remaining 45 minutes.
3. Remove from the oven and plate the lamb shanks and vegetables.
4. Pour the remaining liquid into a pan and reduce on high heat for about 5 minutes.
5. Drizzle the reduced red wine sauce over the lamb. Sprinkle chopped parsley over the plate.
6. Eat!

I took some photos of the lamb shank without the vegetables since I wanted to replicate what it looks like in-game:

Image from WoWhead

 But, to have a balance meal, you need to throw in some vegetables!

GG WP!

Hopefully this dish has satisfied your Draenor cuisine cravings for now. Until next time, happy hunting!

I was fortunate enough to get an invite to the Heart of the Swarm CBT. To my dismay, I was also (un)fortunate enough be invited at the same time all of the pros were receiving their invites. This resulted in a total of 74 players online at a time. I’m very confident that if I did ladder, I would be placed in negative bronze league. Not regular bronze league, but rather, negative bronze league.

However, I did enjoy messing around in custom games with the new Terran units. To this day, I still mourn the lost of our dear comrade, the Warhound. Perhaps one day he will make his grand return, but I’m not that hopeful.

So here’s a recipe to get you hyped for the upcoming expansion. Get ready because the swarm is coming…

Please note that many of the ingredients are used in different parts of the dish (example: garlic is used in the sauce and the marinade).

UNIT COMPOSITION

FOR THE LAMB MARINADE

1. salt
2. pepper
3. 1 1/2 teaspoon of cumin
4. 1 teaspoon of cloves
5. 1 teaspoon of cinnamon
6. 1/2 teaspoon of nutmeg
7. 5 garlic cloves
8. 1 teaspoon of lemon juice
9. 1 tablespoon of white vinegar
10. 1 cup of greek yogurt
11. 1 1/2 lbs of lamb shoulder (cut into strips)
12. olive oil (for cooking)

FOR THE GARLIC SAUCE & EXTRAS

1. salt
2. 4 garlic cloves (roasted in the oven)
3. 1 tablespoon of lemon juice
4. 1 cup of greek yogurt
5. 1/2 of an onion
6. pita bread

FOR THE SALAD

1. salt
2. pepper
3. dill (fresh is better)
4. parsley (fresh is better)
5. 1 cucumber
6. 2 heirloom tomatoes
7. 1 tablespoon of lemon juice

BUILD ORDER

Total prep time will be about ~35 minutes. Since this recipe does require a marinating process, the total idle team will be about 12 – 24 hours. Total cook time will be about 35 minutes. This recipe will serve 4 people.

OPENING

1. Dice your garlic.
2. Place a sealable plastic bag in a bowl. This plastic bag will be used to hold the marinade. If you do not have a plastic bag, just use a bowl and cover the finished marinade with plastic wrap.
3. Combine your ingredients: yogurt, lemon juice, diced garlic, salt, pepper, vinegar, cloves, cumin, cinnamon, and nutmeg.
4. Stir to combine ingredients.
5. Slice your lamb into thin strips.
6. Place lamb in the marinade.
7. Allow lamb to marinate in the refrigerator for at least 12 hours.

MID GAME

1. When the lamb has finished marinating, remove from refrigerator.
2. Set a pan to high heat and place a teaspoon of olive oil in the pan.
3. Place lamb strips in the pan. Let lamb strips cook for about 5 minutes on each side.
4. Remove from pan and let rest.
5. Chop your onions.
6. Place your chopped onions in the hot pan.
7. Sauté onions until translucent.
8. Pre-heat oven to 400°F (204° C).
9. Place 4 garlic cloves in a small oven-safe dish. Roast garlic until soft (~20 minutes).
10. When garlic is cooked, remove and let cool.
11. Place garlic in a food processor (if you don’t have a food processor, you can use a blender) with salt, lemon juice and yogurt. Process until combined.
12. Remove from food processor and set aside. This will be your garlic sauce.

LATE GAME

1. Dice your cucumbers and heirloom tomatoes.
2. Place in a small bowl.
3. Combine with salt, dill, parsley, pepper and lemon juice.
4. Drain any excess liquid from the salad before plating.
5. Plate your shawarma, garlic sauce, salad and pita bread.
6. Eat!

And that’s all you need! GG WP.

Now you have a dish to celebrate the upcoming HoTS release… Or, celebrate your latest acceptance into HoTS beta! Or, if neither of those are your things, you can enjoy watching The Avengers! Hooray shawarma!