Lavender Crusted Lanb Rack with Blueberry Sauce

A little treat: crusted lamb rack with a fruity sauce.

• 1 small lamb rack (about 350g-400g)
• 1 level tablespoon ground lavender
• crumbs from 1-2 slices of bread- enough to coat the rack
• leaves from 1 sprig of rosemary, very finely chopped
• some more rosemary- perhaps another large sprig torn into little bits
• 50g blueberries
• 50ml ruby port
• sugar to sweeten the sauce- around half a tablespoon but best done to taste.
• roasted new potatoes and a green vegetable such as steamed asparagus, or salad to serve

Preheat your oven to gas mark 7.
Mix the breadcrumbs with the lavender and chopped rosemary.
Make deep slits between each rib bone in the rack. Push a piece of torn rosemary into each slit.
Coat the meat in the breadcrumb mixture.
Roast the meat to required doneness, then cover with foil and leave to rest for 15 minutes. As a rough guide, my 500g rack took 18 minutes to be roasted rare.
Place the berries in a blender. Add the port and blitz until smooth.
Strain the blueberry/port mixture into a small saucepan.
Bring the blueberry sauce to a gentle bubble. Allow to reduce until thick and syrupy.
Add sugar to taste. The sauce should have a slight tang to it but shouldn’t be very acidic. Adding extra port may help if your blueberries were very tangy.
Cut the rack into cutlets and serve with the sauce on roasted baby new potatoes and steamed asparagus.