“For our anniversary, my wife and I ate an entire lamb”
Wayne Walker, a 43-year-old cook from High Park North, could think of no better way to celebrate their love than to devour a whole animal together
Besides Pizza, Beast Pizza is known for their whole-animal dinners, which transform entire lambs, ducks, elk and other creatures into six-course experiences for $175 per person.
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This past November, my wife and I decided such a dinner was the perfect way to celebrate our one-year wedding anniversary, and we settled on lamb. You also get to choose how adventurous you want the menu to be. We thought about requesting “no eyeballs” but ultimately decided that, whatever they cooked, we’d try.
The first course was an elevated take on a spring roll, with the unusual addition of finely chopped lamb tongue wrapped in rice paper and paired with a tangy Vietnamese nuoc cham dip. The next course was the showstopper: an insanely rich French onion–style broth poured over thin slices of lamb belly. You could tell the broth had been simmering for days.
Chef Nathan Middleton followed that up with lamb chops, a tender lamb saddle—which isn’t something you can find easily, even at a quality butcher’s—and lamb sausage stuffed with earthy morel mushrooms. For dessert, we were served a coconut panna cotta with perfectly tart yellow kiwi and raspberry jam. My wife and I jokingly wondered if they would try to sneak the eyeballs into the dessert, but if they did, we couldn’t find them. I’m already fantasizing about their duck menu.
