Lamb Rack Cooked in a Haystack with Sweet Potato, Onion Marmalade, Chickpeas, and Merguez

On the farm, cooking with hay is an old and common practice, so bringing this practice to Manhattan’s fine-dining scene is a pleasure for me. We light the hay on fire, so that when we present the hay-wrapped lamb to the table, smoke fills the dining room with its fragrance. We even infuse the jus with hay. (In this recipe, I only call for veal jus. But at the restaurant we would roast lamb bones and simmer them in the veal jus for 20 minutes, then strain them through a chinois.) I think thi