Commonality of Lamb in Dishes

A few facts to b-b-b-b-bore ya

The US, as of Jan 07, has 6.2 million sheep.  Not so surprising.
What was surprising was the top two states for sheep.
Texas is number 1 followed by, get this...... California!!    dunno , just never, ever associated sheep and California. Oh well learn something new everyday. Suppose I can go back to bed now.

By world standards the US doesn't even come close to the world leaders,

  1. China     170.9
  2. Australia 102.7
  3. Europe    99.3
  4. Russia    65.3
  5. India     62.5
  6. Iran      54.0
  7. Sudan     49.0
  8. N.Z.      39.9
  9. UK        35.3
10. S. Africa  25.3

Interestingly most US lamb is sold in the US yet most of the US mutton is sold to Mexico.

Incidentally, as the granddaughter of a Utah sheep farmer, sheep do tend to reek when unshorn, a combination of dirt, lanolin, etc in the wool, shorn they are not nasty smelling, although I think sheep s**t is right up there with pig s**t for downright nasty!  As to the meat, lamb is very delicate, but mutton (grown up sheep) is both stronger flavoured and definitely strong smelling.

Nice bit of lamb, garlic, rosemary, some lemon and butter, mmmmm, it doesn't get any better.