Ternasco de Aragón: Aragonese milk-fed lamb

Aragón, Spain

Aragón's protected designation milk-fed lamb — distinct from the Castilian cordero lechal in using Rasa Aragonesa, Ojinegra de Teruel, and Roya Bilbilitana breeds, slaughtered between 45 and 90 days old at 7-13kg live weight. The Ternasco de Aragón IGP (PGI) represents the most important meat product of the Aragonese cuisine — a young lamb roasted simply in a clay cazuela with garlic, white wine, lard, and bay leaf, producing meat of extraordinary whiteness and delicacy. The Ebro valley region of Aragón, between the Pyrenees and the Mediterranean, produces lambs that feed on their mothers' milk supplemented with grain — the result is a larger, slightly firmer animal than the pure milk-fed lechazos of Castilla but with comparable tenderness and a slightly more developed (though still very mild) flavour.