Okay, first a bit about the meat. You can start with pretty much any decent cut of lamb, I often use shoulder steaks, but lamb tenderloin is good (but you'll pay through the nose for it). Any decent quality cut of lamb will do. You want two steaks, each between 3/4 and one pound (the absolute best is those little loin chops on the bone, sort of the lamb version of a nice t-bone steak).

First, I take a little dish and mix the following ingredients to taste (it depends on the meat and your tastes so you'll have to experiment. I list them however in approximate order of quantity. It's pretty hard to screw up really:

Now you want to mix in a tiny bit of Extra Virgin Olive Oil and a little bit of Balsamic Vinegar in, just enough to make a paste out of it. The vinegar helps it brown up nicely in the broiler.

To many, the lack of Rosemary may seem shocking, but I come from a long line of Rosemary haters (something on my mother's side of the family, to us it tastes like a sweaty armpit smells), and for the longest time though I didn't like lamb, only to find out that it was just the overuse of rosemary. However, it is still a good idea to create a savory flavor to accentuate the natural flavor of the lamb. The combination of thyme, sage, cumin, and mustard seed serves this purpose well without employing any rosemary.

Now you rub this paste on all sides of the meat and set it aside for a few minutes. While you have put that aside, take a high walled Cast Iron Skillet (it's got to be tall enough that the walls of the skillet come at least a couple inches above the tops of the meat. Take this pan, and pour in some more of that olive oil, even just an eighth of an inch in the bottom will do. Put the pan with the oil in the broiler so it's something like a foot or so under the fire.

On top of the slabs of meat cut up some sweet cream butter, about one stick for every two pounds of meat. You want to cut into little pats and tile the top surface of the meat with it.

Now, wait until the pan is hot (you will know this is the case when you open the oven and the sudden presence of oxygen causes the oil in the pan to start smoking suddenly). Plop the steaks (butter side up) very carefully in the pan so as not to let the hot grease splash you.

Let them cook for about three minutes and flip them, after that cook them to taste (I like my medium rare (which works out to four minutes on the second side, seven total)). I tend to serve this with fresh Itialian bread and a salad, maybe with some good sharp goat cheese on the side. I find that it's good also with Mead or a good beer.

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