Healthy Lamb Main Dish Recipes

Juicy lamb chops take a trip to the Middle East with a quick herb-and-lemon rub and a tangy cucumber-tahini sauce. Serve with couscous or rice pilaf and a green salad.

This slow-cooked lamb and eggplant stew melts in your mouth. Sumac, a lemony-flavored spice, gives the dish a fruity, tangy aroma. Look for it in Mediterranean markets or spice shops. Serve the stew over mashed root vegetables, bulgur or brown rice.

In this elegant lamb recipe perfect for entertaining, boneless leg of lamb gets a mint and garlic rub. The butterflied lamb cooks in record time and the varying thickness means some slices will be more done than others, so there's something for everyone. The recipe calls for a cut that's large enough to serve about 16 people and still have enough leftovers to make an awesome sandwich or pasta.

This brothy stew is boldly flavored with a blend of characteristic Middle Eastern spices and finished with fresh spinach and fiber-rich chickpeas. Economical lamb shoulder tenderizes beautifully when leisurely cooked in a slow cooker. If you can't find boneless shoulder stew meat, do not substitute more-expensive lamb leg--it tends to dry out during slow cooking. Instead, purchase lamb shoulder chops and debone them. Serve over bulgur and accompany with a salad.

These healthy burgers get a Mediterranean twist with a yogurt sauce seasoned with oregano, lemon and feta cheese. If you can't find ground lamb, ask the butcher to grind some for you.

This fragrant leg of lamb is seasoned with blood orange juice, garlic, cumin, ras el hanout and grains of paradise. Read more about this recipe.

Kefta, seasoned ground meat, is one of Morocco's most popular street foods. Traditionally, kefta is washed down with a glass of sweet mint tea. It's delicious served with ratatouille.

Lamb stew is Irish penicillin: a rich stew full of potatoes, leeks and carrots that'll cure whatever ails you. In traditional fashion, nothing here is browned first, just all stewed together--in this case, in a slow cooker to make it extra easy. To keep it healthy make sure to trim the lamb of any visible fat before you cook it.

Made with just about any kind of meat, kebabs are classic Iranian street food. Lamb is the predominant red meat eaten in Iran, and its liver is a delicacy. Lemon, garlic and fresh basil nicely balance the liver's mineral flavor.

The meat sauce in this healthy pasta recipe is a Greek take on a red chili. This recipe calls for ground lamb but you could easily use ground beef or ground turkey instead.

Lamb with mint jelly is a tried-and-true combination and this recipe takes the idea to new heights. The sweet, shocking green jelly is transformed into a richly flavored and pleasingly dark sauce. Make It a Meal: Serve with whole-wheat couscous and peas.

In this simple shepherd's pie recipe, we call for flavorful lean ground lamb, which isn't always easy to find. You can use lean ground beef or turkey instead. If you want to use lamb, ask your butcher to grind it for you or, to make your own ground lamb, start with a lean cut of lamb, such as leg or loin, trimmed of any excess fat and cut into 3/4-inch pieces. Pulse briefly in a food processor just until uniformly ground.