Cuts · UK butchery
Lamb Henry
A bone-in quarter of lamb shoulder, scored, from AHDB Forequarter L029. A collagen-heavy portion cut that behaves like a small shoulder rather than like a chop — and BBQHQ holds no duration for it, which is why it appears in the cut catalogue and not in the cook chooser.
Known as
The same muscle carries different names in different butchery systems, and some of those names mean different cuts elsewhere. Where a name is ambiguous, BBQHQ says so rather than picking one.
- United Kingdom
- Lamb Henry
- Lamb Henry's
AHDB's own spelling of the specification title.
Where it comes from on the animal
Lamb shoulder
Forequarter · high use · connective tissue: high
A working shoulder with more fat and collagen than the leg, and the lamb cut that rewards a long cook rather than a fast one.
Muscles: Triceps brachii, Supraspinatus, Infraspinatus
Asking a butcher for it
Named the way uk butchery names it. If the counter does not recognise the name, the anatomy is the fallback: ask for the cut by where it comes from.
- What to say
- Lamb Henry, or Lamb Henry's (GB) depending where you are.
- If that draws a blank
- Ask for forequarter — the muscle is Triceps brachii, Supraspinatus, Infraspinatus.
- What to specify
- Typical weight is 300–450 g.
What it is suited to
Derived from how hard the muscle works and how much connective tissue it carries, which is the pairing that decides whether a cut wants a fire under it or beside it. BBQHQ does not rank cuts and does not name a best one.
- High connective tissue: this wants long, low, indirect heat. Collagen converts to gelatine slowly and well above any safety endpoint, so the cut is tough until it has had the time and tender afterwards. Cooking it fast makes it worse, not quicker.
- A hard-working muscle, which is why it carries the tissue it does and why it rewards patience.
What to use instead
A substitute is not the same as an equivalent. These are graded, because “yes, use that instead” is the answer that ruins dinners: most real substitutions work only once something about the cook changes.
No cut in US butchery corresponds
Not a substitute for this
AHDB Forequarter L029 defines Lamb Henry's by PORTIONING rather than by anatomy: a rustic shoulder (L028) is sheet-boned with the neck fillet left on, the breast tip and knuckle are sawn off through the humerus, the fat pocket is removed, the outside is scored, and the blade-bone and humerus sections are each halved to give four portions. IMPS specifies shoulder items by boundary, not by portion count, so there is no counterpart item to map to.
- The defining step is dividing one shoulder into four equal bone-in portions. IMPS has no portioned lamb shoulder item, so the American system describes the primal this comes from and not the product.
- Scoring the outside is part of the British specification. No IMPS lamb item specifies scoring.
Asking for it in another country
US butchery: No direct equivalent
AHDB Forequarter L029 defines Lamb Henry's by PORTIONING rather than by anatomy: a rustic shoulder (L028) is sheet-boned with the neck fillet left on, the breast tip and knuckle are sawn off through the humerus, the fat pocket is removed, the outside is scored, and the blade-bone and humerus sections are each halved to give four portions. IMPS specifies shoulder items by boundary, not by portion count, so there is no counterpart item to map to.
What differs
- The defining step is dividing one shoulder into four equal bone-in portions. IMPS has no portioned lamb shoulder item, so the American system describes the primal this comes from and not the product.
- Scoring the outside is part of the British specification. No IMPS lamb item specifies scoring.
The UK side of these mappings rests on AHDB’s published cutting specifications, which BBQHQ has read. The US side does not: USDA’s Institutional Meat Purchase Specifications and the Beef Checkoff cut pages both refuse automated access, so no mapping here reaches “same cut” across two butchery systems. See the open question.
Typical size
300–450 g